


a baker's dozen more

by elizajane



Series: hold it, and share it [9]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Coming Out, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, M/M, Not Beta Read
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-07-28 19:11:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 24,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7653355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elizajane/pseuds/elizajane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eric can’t wait until he lands at Logan and has New England beneath his feet and Jack within arm’s reach again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sunday, 2 August 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all seem to really enjoy the "Jack and Bitty hang out together and do stuff" snippets, so basically this will be more of the same. There'll be some birthday cake, talk about coming out (how, when, to whom), some updates on Shitty and Lardo and the rest of the Haus residents, the parents, Georgia and Joelle, etc. etc. etc. 
> 
> TL;DR if you're looking for the sprawling domesticity fic of all sprawling domesticity fics I may possibly have a 'verse with your name on it. 
> 
> I'll be updating this daily between August 2nd and August 14th, 2016. As before, these chapters are going up unbetaed and I will likely be making light edits throughout the project.

As the plane turns and tilts for the final descent into Logan airport, Eric shifts in his window seat so he can watch the harbor islands pass by beneath the wings, the Boston skyline pulling into view against the sunset.

This morning, he’d woken up in his childhood bedroom in Madison, had breakfast with his parents and attended church with his suitcases in the back of the van. After the service, his parents had driven him up to Hartsfield-Jackson. It had surprised Eric how hard it was, this time, to say goodbye. He’s done this before -- two or three times a year for the past two years -- but this time leaving had felt imbued with a finality that previous departures had not. He’s always, before, been leaving home for awhile; half-dreading, half-anticipating the next return. This time, he knows he’ll be back in Madison, sure -- maybe at Thanksgiving, maybe at Christmas, maybe a week next summer -- but he isn’t _living_ there any longer. 

The balance of home has irrevocably shifted.

He wants it to, he _needs_ it to. He can’t wait until he lands at Logan and has New England beneath his feet and Jack within arm’s reach again. But knowing that hadn’t made it feel any less like an elbow to his side when he’d hesitated in front of his parents and realized that they, too, understood this time was different than all the times before.

They’d waited for him to hand over his checked bag and call up his boarding pass on his phone and then there’d been nothing left to do but say goodbye. He’d hugged his mom and gotten a side-hug from Coach, promised to text when he landed in Boston, and headed for the security with a final wave over his shoulder.

A two-hour delay and a three hour flight later, the wheels hit the runway at Logan and Eric is back on Massachusetts ground. He pulls his phone out of his backpack while they’re taxiing toward the gate and sees a series of texts from Jack:

 _At the airport._  
  
_You had a checked bag right?_  
_I’ll be down by the luggage carousels._  
  
_Here._  
_When you get here._

Eric texts him back -- _Here! Taxiing FOREVER ugh_ \-- then texts his mother to let her know he’s on the ground and Jack is here to pick him up. The two women next to him, on their way to a business conference or expo of some kind, are discussing dinner plans. Though he knows it's unwarranted, their obvious visitor status makes Eric feel smug. He finds himself looking for an opening to lean over and make it clear he gets to walk off the plane into his boyfriend’s arms. _I belong here!_ he wants to tell everyone on board.  _This is where I live now!_

He sees Jack a second or two before Jack looks up from his phone and sees Eric, a smile lighting up his face and oh Lord help him but Eric will never never _never_ get enough of making Jack smile. He’s found an out-of-the-way bench to sit on, behind an arrivals board and next to one of the Dunkin' Donuts stands where people walking by will be looking for food rather than professional hockey players picking up their boyfriends. He’s wearing his glasses and the Camp Oconee cap that Eric had bought him as a kinda-sorta joke (but mostly not because seeing Jack wearing it makes Eric melt just that little bit more inside).

They hadn’t talked about this, but Eric takes a chance as he walks up to Jack and reaches out with his free hand to pull Jack to his feet and into a kiss. And it must be okay because Jack comes willingly, arms sliding around Eric’s waist to steady him as Eric lifts up on his toes to lean in for a kiss.

“Hey,” Jack murmurs against Eric’s mouth and, _God,_ _yes, please_ Eric’s missed this. He’s barely stopped thinking about kissing Jack since putting Jack on his own flight back to Logan three weeks ago. And _still_ his memory hasn’t done justice to how good and right it feels to be in Jack’s arms. Ten seconds in and he’s already wondering, with a slight edge of panic, how he will get through the school year to come without Jack on every roadie, without sleeping under the same roof.

Jack lets go and steps back to ask, “How was the flight?” as if Eric hadn’t complained his way through the flight delays on his phone. Eric suddenly remembers the last time he was in Logan. How he’d stepped shakily down from the Samwell shuttle and nearly forgotten to wait for his suitcase on the curb. How he’d been gripping his phone so hard he accidentally turned it off twice and had to fumble it, desperately, back on to ensure that the texts from Jack were still there. How he’d made it through security and then stumbled into the closest restroom where he could close himself in a stall for a short but messy crying jag.

His skin, then, had felt paper-thin and bruised all over. It doesn’t feel that way now.

“You hungry?” Jack asks. “We can stop somewhere for food.” But Eric shakes his head. “Can you just take me h--” he trips over the word _home_ and corrects himself, although he couldn’t say why, “-- back to your place? Would that be okay?”

Jack smiles. “Yeah, that’d be okay.”

* * *

They collect Eric’s checked baggage and tow everything out to Jack’s car in the parking garage. Then Eric folds himself into the passenger seat and slides a hand over Jack’s thigh _just because he can_ , feeling Jack's muscles tense and shift as he puts the car into reverse and then drive and navigates their way out of the garage and then the maze of airport roadways into the Ted Williams tunnel and eventually onto I-93 where they get caught in post-game traffic heading south out of the city..

“Afternoon game against the Rays,” Jack says.

“Seems they lost, 4-3,” Eric says, looking it up on his phone. No wonder the drivers seem irritable. Or maybe that's just Boston.

The snaking traffic crawls slowly past the exits for Roxbury, Andrew Square, Columbia Point, Quincy. Jack is a quiet driver, focused on the road, and Eric enjoys watching southeastern Massachusetts slide by in the gathering twilight. Jack has the air conditioning on in the car, but they’re traveling at a slow enough speed that Eric rolls down his window to enjoy how not-suffocating the summer heat is here compared with the last few days back in Georgia. He’s not going to need a shower before bed tonight...although, he thinks, glancing over at Jack, he might _want_ one. It’s been a long three weeks.

He slides his hand down Jack’s leg to the hem of his shorts, running light fingers over the coarse hair on Jack’s thigh, then back again up the warm inside of his --

“Driving,” Jack reminds him, clapping a firm hand on Eric’s wrist -- though he's clearly amused. “You distracting little shit.”

Eric rolls his eyes. “We’re going thirty miles an hour.” But he drags his hand back up to the top of Jack’s leg, near where the seat belt crosses over his hip, and stops his teasing. Safety first. Sex later.

“So what do you want to do for your birthday?” Eric asks instead, to distract himself as much as Jack. He’s never been around for Jack’s birthday before. “I mean, besides cake which I will obviously make for you.”

“You’re gonna make me a cake?” Jack sounds both both happy and slightly wary. As if no one's ever made him a birthday cake before. Eric wonders what Jack's childhood birthdays were like -- probably a lot different from the water balloon fights and family feasts of his own childhood.

“Honey,” Eric pats Jack on the leg, “of course I’m baking you a cake. What sort of boyfriend do you take me for. What’s your favorite?”

“Maple apple?” Jack’s teasing him now.

“Cake, sweetheart. Not pie. Although a maple-apple cake would be...”

“What about something with cinnamon,” Jack says. “I have some of that cinnamon I brought down for your mom. Kind of a lot of it.”

“Mmm...” Eric thumbs open the browser on his phone and keeps himself busy all the way to the I-95 junction looking for something to bake featuring Jack’s amazing cinnamon.

* * *

The sun is all but set when they turn into Jack’s apartment building, so Eric only has a fleeting impression of a quiet street and massive trees, a deeper darkness in the direction of the river Jack tells him flows below the north face of the reclaimed factory building. The night sounds here, as they climb out of the car, are Samwell night sounds in Eric’s ears.

Jack helps him unload his two suitcases and backpack, locks the car from the key fob, and guides Eric with a little more touching than strictly necessary across the parking lot to a side entrance lit by a single bare bulb.

“Here -- there’s a security code for the main entrance,” Jack says. “It’s your birthday backwards.” He punches in 5-9-5-0 into the box and there’s a beep and a click as the door unlocks to allow passage.

Eric follows Jack inside, “My birthday...backwards?”

“I _was_ a captive audience for all of Dex’s rants about online security on the team bus last year,” Jack reminds him dryly, over his shoulder, as they step into the foyer.

“Jack, my man!” calls the young man behind the desk across the lobby by the main entrance. “Package came in for you while you were out.”

“It’s Sunday?” Jack says, like it’s a question, but the guy waves the point away like it’s irrelevant.

“I dunno man, FedEx International -- they deliver seven days a week if you got enough to pay for it. Who do you know in...” he picks up the flat, rectangular box and peers down at the shipping labels, “...Turin?”

Jack snorts. “That’ll be my parents.” He walks across to the desk and collects the package. He tucks it under his arm and then hesitates.

“Lester, this is Eric,” he says, gesturing to where Eric is standing by the luggage. “Friend from college. He’s crashing with me until the semester starts. Eric, this is Lester. Staffs the desk on weekends. If you need anything and I’m out...”

“Nice meeting you, man,” Lester says, putting out a hand.

Eric steps forward and leans over the faux marble counter top to take it. “Pleasure to meet you as well,” he says, sweetly, to cover the twist of pain of being introduced as Jack’s _friend from college_. While technically true, and the explanation they’d settled on together, for now, to buy themselves time, it still feels like an erasure of what being here with Jack means to him. Means to both of them. And _damn_ , does it hurt.

While Eric is shaking Lester’s hand, Jack picks up the larger of the two suitcases. He tips his head toward the stairs and starts walking so Eric doesn’t try to make further small talk. He just nods to Lester and follows after.

He’s seen Jack’s apartment over Skype and in pictures, but even a webcam tour can’t capture the feeling of an unfamiliar space the way actually standing inside of it does. He hadn’t understood, from the cam images, how light and airy the loft would feel, even in twilight.

“Jack, this is lovely,” he breathes, standing in the entry space and taking it in. The bedroom and bath to his right, the kitchen area to his left, and straight ahead the living room with its floor-to-ceiling windows facing the darkness and twinkling lights across the river. The pendant lights over the kitchen island that Jack has turned on provide a dim glow by which he can see the odd mix of compulsively tidy and lived-in that he remembers from Jack’s room at the Haus. There’s something slightly...odd about the arrangement of Jack’s things in the space, but standing in the doorway he can’t quite put his finger on it and chalks it up to the hasty tidying you do before someone comes to stay.

He hears Jack close and lock the door behind them, the _chink_ of keys hitting the counter top. And then there’s Jack’s warmth and weight behind him, hands and arms sliding possessively around his waist, lips soft against his neck.

“Hey,” Jack says again. “I’m really glad you’re here, Bits.”

“Me too, sweetheart,” Eric says, feeling the prickle behind his eyes that’s the relief of letting Jack hold him. “I love you and I missed you.”

“I missed you and I love you,” Jack murmurs against the curve of Eric’s throat, nipping just hard enough to pinch but not leave a visible mark. Movement catches Eric’s eye and he looks up to see the two of them reflected in the living room window, himself cradled in Jack’s arms with Jack’s face pressed against his neck. _Well fuck,_  he thinks, _that's surprisingly...hot_. He watches himself slide his own hands down Jack’s forearms to his wrists, turn into Jack’s kisses, and it’s mesmerizing to look at himself as one half of a couple.

“Tell me I’m your boyfriend, Jack?” he says, suddenly, twisting in Jack’s arms to look up at him.

“You’re my boyfriend,” Jack says, obediently and without hesitation. “Was that a question?”

“Not...not really,” Eric admits. “I just wanted to hear you say it.”

"You're my boyfriend," Jack repeats, "and I'm  _your_ boyfriend."

"Mmm," Eric agrees, contentedly, leaning back against Jack's chest and letting Jack take his weight. It's a peaceful sort of silence. Until Eric's stomach decides it's a good time to let out a loud gurgle of protest.

Jack snorts. "Shall we order a pizza?"

"Yeah," Eric agrees. "Let's order a pizza. And then I've got plans for that couch."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is a play on the text of [a poem by Catullus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_5%20):
> 
> "Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred,  
> then another thousand, then a second hundred,  
> then yet another thousand, then a hundred;  
> then, when we have counted up many thousands,  
> let us shake it [the abacus], lest we know,  
> or lest anyone [bad] may be jealous  
> when they know, how many kisses there were."
> 
> Which I first encountered in Diana Gabandon's _Outlander_ series for which she apparently used this very loose translation, [Out of Catullus](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/50318), by Richard Crashaw:
> 
> "Then let amorous kisses dwell  
> On our lips, begin and tell  
> A Thousand, and a Hundred, score  
> An Hundred, and a Thousand more,  
> Till another Thousand smother  
> That, and that wipe of another.  
> Thus at last when we have numbred  
> Many a Thousand, many a Hundred;  
> Wee’l confound the reckoning quite,  
> And lose our selves in wild delight."
> 
> Didn't y'all want to know the [order of exits](https://m.roadnow.com/i93/Massachusetts-Exit-Southbound.html%20) on southbound I-93 between Boston and I-95?
> 
> And the Red Sox [did, in fact, lose](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=red+sox+2+August+2015) to the Tampa Rays on 2 August 2015. Thanks, Google!


	2. Monday, 3 August 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ran out of time this evening to write everything I wanted to in this chapter...including the baking of cake! I might figure out a way to incorporate some of the plotty points into chapter three, but in the meantime Stultiloquentia found Eric [the perfect birthday cake recipe](http://www.ottolenghi.co.uk/apple-and-olive-oil-cake-with-maple-icing-shop)!

The second time Eric wakes on the morning of Jack’s birthday, he’s alone in Jack’s bed -- alone in Jack’s apartment. He’s gotten tangled in the sky blue sheets and lemon yellow cotton bedspread Jack bought because, he said, it reminded him of the paint on Eric’s bedroom walls. He’d said this like it was just a factual explanation and not a piece of information specifically designed to be the final straw, the final piece of sweet _Jack-ness_ that turns Eric into a puddle of goo.

He rolls over to find Señor Bun glaring at him judgmentally from the bedside table. Bun apparently has opinions about Eric’s decision to sleep in rather than go running with Jack, despite the fact that Jack’s alarm had gone off at the wildly inappropriate hour of _five_ on his _birthday_. Jack had silenced the radio almost immediately, but its unfamiliar voices had already pulled Eric into semi-wakefulness.

He must have said something, or at least grunted, because Jack rolled back over to press a kiss to his forehead and murmur, quietly, “Hey. Morning, Bits.”

And Eric must have made another sound, or possibly a rude gesture, because Jack had laughed quietly and said, “I’m gonna go out for a run and you’re welcome to join me, but I’ll take that as a ‘fuck off’?”

Eric had rolled over onto his back so he could glare up at Jack. “It’s your _birthday._ ”

Jack’s shoulder had risen and dropped again in the grey predawn light that had begun to filter over the top of the bedroom wall from the living room windows. “It’s a nice morning. I thought I’d try a new route through Swan Point Cemetery. When I get home we can take a shower and make breakfast.”

“I don’t know if it should be considered morning if the sun isn’t up yet,” Eric points out skeptically. This is an old argument, one they've been having since the old checking practice days, but Eric holds firm ... and so does Jack. 

Jack grins down at him, “In that case, you’ve got --” he glances down at his phone, “-- eighteen more minutes of night left, if you care to use it...?”

Eric had reached up, then, and pulled Jack down for a good morning kiss. The kiss had gotten complicated. And at some point Eric had woken up enough to remember that he and Jack had fallen asleep without clothes on the night before.

In the end, Jack had made it out the door for his run shortly after six. Once he'd left, Eric let himself doze back off but -- as sometimes happened after orgasm -- he fell asleep for maybe half an hour only to wake up fully alert just before seven. And even though he’s been accustomed all summer to sleeping until maybe eight or nine after staying awake until midnight he can tell he’s awake, now, and trying to fall back asleep will just leave him feeling restless and annoyed.

So he disentangles himself from the bedclothes and swings his feet down to the floor. The daylight spilling in now is tinged with a sunny glow that tells Eric it’s a clear day outside, even before he pads to the bathroom and then out into the living room. There’s something decadent about being here, about being alone in his boyfriend’s apartment, having appropriated one of his boyfriend’s oversized Samwell sweatshirts to hunker down in until Jack returns. He feels a bit like a spy, even if an invited one, given the opportunity to learn everything he can about Jack from the way he’s arranged his space, from the things he’s chosen to keep marking past chapters of his life, from the things he’s newly-acquired this summer to fill this sunlit space.

Things like sky blue sheets and lemon yellow bedspreads.

Things like the black module bookcases along the far wall, neatly filled with photography manuals, history books, one shelf of cookbooks and food writing.

Things like the desk by the window cluttered with photo prints and scribbled lists in Jack’s blocky, cramped writing.

Things like the pie safe Eric had given him, which Jack had insisted on paying to ship to Rhode Island rather than wait for Eric’s parents to bring it up on their fall visit. He’s placed it between the coat tree and the closet that houses the washer-dryer unit, away from the daylight that would gradually fade Frank and Vince into nothingness.

Wandering the empty apartment, Eric can’t shake the impression he had last night that something is subtly … off about the organization of Jack’s things. But it takes the keys hanging on the wall above the pie safe for him to put it together. There’s a little wooden strip with hooks nailed to the wall to the left of the front door, clearly intended as a place for hanging keys. And there’s a Falconers key fob dangling there, two shiny keys hanging from it. Eric notices it on his first circuit of the loft and his eyes slide right past. Yet as he passes it a second time on his way to the bedroom for a pair of socks, he realizes that they can’t be Jack’s keys because Jack is out running and had taken his keys with him. Eric remembers the _snick_ of the key in the lock as Jack locked the door behind him. So these are _extra_ keys.

They’re _Eric’s_ keys.

He takes the keys down from the hook and weighs them in his hand. Thinks about the fact Jack had them cut, picked out a cheesy key ring that he must have known Eric will carry everywhere with him despite the fact it’s the world’s dullest shade of navy blue.

He goes into the bedroom carrying the keys and rummages in his suitcase for a pair of socks, sitting down on the edge of the bed to put them on. He considers the bedroom and the matching bedside tables -- Bun on his, Monsieur Éléphant leaning drunkenly against Jack’s reading lamp. He walks over to the closet -- which Jack had pulled towels out of the night before but which Eric hadn’t actually investigated -- and considers the neatly-hung button-down shirts, the shelves and drawers.

The empty spaces.

He goes back out into the living room and turns a full circle, considering the question of space. And finally he gets it. He gets it and it makes him feel a little shaky on his feet so he gropes his way to the kitchen island and slides onto one of the stools tucked under the counter top.

Jack’s made _space_ for him. Systematically. This apartment, it’s Jack’s through and through. It’s the same balance of organized chaos, of well-used tools on the verge of being neatly stored away, that Eric remembers from Jack’s room at the Haus, from Jack’s luggage on roadies, from Jack’s cubby in the locker room at Faber. But in every room, there’s space for Eric -- for Eric’s clothes, for Eric’s books and DVDs and music, a space for a second desk, for artwork on the walls, he’s left cupboards in the kitchen bare and waiting to be filled.

The bedside table that stood empty and waiting until Eric had dug Señor Bun out of his suitcase and dropped him there to stand sentinel through the night.

Eric’s still sitting on the stool in the kitchen, thoughtfully tossing the keys in his hand, when he hears Jack’s key turn in the lock. A second later, as Eric is twisting around in his seat, Jack slips back in the front door flushed and sweaty and gorgeous from his morning run. Looking at him, Eric isn't sure how he was ever able to play on Jack's team, share a locker room, share a house, share a life without anyone who saw them realizing instantly that he's entirely Jack's. 

Well, he thinks, remembering the reactions of their Hausmates to the news, maybe they had all realized. And were just too polite to point it out. 

Eric smiles, catches the keys underhand, and fists them into his (Jack's) sweatshirt pocket. Then he slides off the stool to go over and greet Jack with a kiss as Jack pulls off his headphones and thumbs off the radio.

Time for a shower, he thinks, and maybe some birthday waffles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sunrise in Pawtucket [on 3 August 2015](http://www.sunrise-and-sunset.com/en/sun/united-states/boston__ma/2015/august) would have been approximately 5:39. Like Jack, I wake at first light ... unlike Jack, I do not go out running. Although I have, in past chapters of life.


	3. Tuesday, 4 August 2015

On Tuesday, Jack is taking Bitty to the arena.

It’s been on their schedule, inasmuch as they have one for Eric’s visit, in part because Erin Jakowski* wants to meet Eric and in part because Jack is actually excited to show him around.

Everything about the Falconers' arena is a little bit glitzier, a little bit more larger-than-life than Faber, and walking into the complex still provokes in Jack a complicated mix of emotional reactions: wary pride, giddy awe, a lingering fear about what will happen if he fails to live up to expectations. Marci’s tasked him with articulating what failure looks like, and whose expectations he’s trying to live up to. It’s a homework assignment still very much in progress.

But still, Jack finds as they eat breakfast bumping knees at the kitchen island that morning, that the idea of taking Eric to see where he’ll be playing come fall is a happy one. He’s anticipating it with pleasure rather than mounting anxiety.

Recognizing this causes his brain to suggest that this unusual state of affairs is, itself, a cause for concern. Maybe, his brain suggests unhelpfully, maybe he’s not worried _enough_. What sort of reckless idiot is he -- and Jack tries to remind his brain that “idiot” is not a term Shitty would approve of, but his brain refuses to listen -- what sort of reckless idiot is he, anyway, thinking he’s entitled to walk into the arena with Eric at his side like this is _normal_ like this is the sort of thing _anyone_ might do.

 _But it is the sort of thing anyone might do_, Jack reminds himself firmly. Most of the guys he’s already met from the Falconers, excepting the question mark of Chris and Dan, don’t seem to be in relationships. But he’s been around the world of professional hockey long enough to know it’s a family affair. Players bring their wives, their kids, their girlfriends to games and team barbecues, to charity galas and awards dinners, and makes plans to rendezvous on the road. Eric should have the right to be treated no differently from anyone else's plus-ones.

When he’d asked George the week before if it would be okay to bring Bitty by to give him a tour she’d responded by asking if Eric might be willing to come back during training and show her players a thing or two about speed.

So he knows he has _permission_.

But he also knows that Eric at his side is notable in a way a girlfriend wouldn’t be. Even if his presence can be explained away by _former teammate, played on my line, needed a place to stay before the start of school, giving him the grand tour_ to anyone besides George and Erin. If, that is, they run into anyone nosy enough to ask. _We probably won't_ , he reminds his brain. _The arena will be mostly empty today._ The team meeting’s been cancelled this week -- Jack is one of a scant handful of players in town and both of the coaches, Thompson and Mishurin, are gone -- and half the staff seems to have scheduled vacation in August.

He mops up the last of his soft-boiled egg with one of the artisan English muffins Eric had found and insisted on purchasing the day before. Jack had teased him about it, but now has to admit that probably he should just cede all culinary decisions to Bitty forever because Bitty’s mere presence makes food more delicious. The cake he’d made the day before, for example, has no right to be as tempting before ten o’clock as it currently is, gazing innocently out from under the glass mixing bowl Eric had used as a makeshift dome.

With his free hand, he reaches over to where Eric is drinking the last of his French press coffee and tapping out a message of some kind on his phone.

“Ransom is asking when are we --” Eric begins, then stops and looks up as Jack slides his fingers across the inside of Eric’s wrist. Jack finds Eric’s wrists fascinating, because they’re narrow and fine-boned, his hands long-fingered with small oval fingernails that he keeps trimmed short and blunt for the kitchen work. His hands are rough and reddened from bleach solution and scarred and calloused working around knives and open flame. Jack had never really thought about Eric’s hands before his trip to Madison, at least not any more than he thought about any other portion of Eric. But since Madison he’s had a lot of time to think about all of the things Eric can do with his hands. How capable and sure they are, how confidently Eric touches Jack even when he’s doing so in ways they’ve never tried before.

Jack also likes the look on Eric’s face when Jack traces the tendons on the inside of Eric’s wrists with his thumb or fingers or tongue, the way he can encircle Eric’s wrist with his thumb and forefinger, catching and holding those capable hands -- pinning them down, keeping them near, holding them at arm’s length as Eric tries to outmaneuver him for control of the moment.  
  
Or, sometimes, lets go and leans into the moment with a sigh of release. Of _yes please_ and _more_.

“Keep that up and we’ll be late for the meeting,” Eric tries, even as he’s turning his wrist upward toward Jack’s palm, eyes flickering to Jack’s mouth and then back up to meet Jack’s gaze.

Jack could tease him, but anything that comes to mind suddenly feels harsh -- like it undercuts the importance of this, of Eric a reach away, Eric who responds with such effortless ease and want to every touch. Eric, who slept beside him all last night with Bun tucked under his pillow. Who grumbled monosyllabicly through a shared shower, then magically whipped up eggs benedict and café au lait brewed to perfection. Jack’s only previous relationship experience involved a lot of aborted touches, unmet gazes, reluctant reciprocity, and the constant feeling of getting it wrong. With Eric, even fumbled plays lead only to something better as Eric responds with _yes, but here_ or _not like -- let me show you_.

“I could live with that,” Jack says, smiling but not like he doesn't mean it. If Eric wanted him to, he'd cancel without a second thought.

“Mmm.” Eric slides off his stool and comes around the corner of the counter to stand between Jack’s knees, “You make a tempting offer. But I really don’t think we should cancel this meeting, Jack.”

Jack sighs. “I know.”

“I like that you’re tempted, though,” Eric offers, shyly, pressing his face into Jack’s shoulder. “Maybe we could rain check whatever it is you’re thinkin' of 'til later this afternoon?”

Jack slides his arms around Bitty’s shoulders and pulls him in for a full-body hug, resting his chin on Eric’s head. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, we could do that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Erin Jakowski is the Director of Public Relations for the team. I have a half-finished “prequel” piece to this chapter in which Jack and George meet with Erin to talk about options for media management. It’s sitting in Google Drive but I didn’t get a chance to finalize it before I started this series. All you need to know (for now) is that plans are in the works at Falconers H.Q. (haha) to enable Jack to be publicly out, in an acknowledged relationship with Eric, with the visible support of his team/employer. I’ll fill in the details once Eric goes back to school ;-)
> 
> The artisan English muffins YOU NEVER KNEW YOU WERE WAITING FOR: “[the beginning of everything delicious](http://www.stoneandskillet.com/%20).” Local-made Boston scrumptiousness.
> 
> * * *
> 
> I also want to say that although Kent Parson is an emotionally manipulative ex in this 'verse, I have been persuaded by wonderful fic authors that Kent Parson redemption narratives are a delicious and heartbreaking thing. So if you need Kent Parson fix-it fic, please go read [GMF](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7382089) (Jack/Eric/Kent), [the weight of your ribs feels like home](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6285277) (Kent/OMC), or [Cover My Eyes (It's Already Over)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6316993) (Kent/OMC) which was the fic that made me a convert. 
> 
> Turns out I am THERE for Kent fic as long as Jack and Bits are still a team in every possible way.
> 
> * * *
> 
> So, like, I realized today looking back on ‘maybe…’ that that whole story involved a lot of Jack and Eric looking outward toward their relationships with other people through necessity: they spent the majority of those seven weeks apart from one another. This time they’re together and, basically, all they seem to want to do is spend time focused on one another.
> 
> I’m like, don’t you want to go grocery shopping? Maybe … visit the arena? Possibly email your parents? Invite Shitty and Lardo for dinner…? 
> 
> And they’re all, “Nah … couch. Bed. Cuddles. We got this.”


	4. Wednesday, 5 August 2015

“...and what muffins do you have today?” Eric asks the waiter, handing back the menu.

“Let’s see we have blueberry, bran, cornmeal and --” the young man glances back over his shoulder toward the kitchen, “-- raspberry, I think. Do you want me to check?”

Eric waves the offer away, “No, that’s fine, I’d like a cornmeal muffin buttered and grilled -- with a side of maple syrup. Would y’all be able to do that for me?”

“Grilled...maple syrup. You got it,” he says. Showing off, Jack thinks, because he’s not writing any of this down. “Enjoy your coffee -- food’ll be up in just a few minutes.”

“Mmm,” Eric nods agreeably, collecting Jack’s menu and handing that over too before the server turns on his heel and heads back to the kitchen. Jack tries not to worry about whether or not what he ordered is what he _should_ have ordered. He’d told himself before Bitty arrived that he wouldn’t stop himself from going out just because pre-season training is coming up and the pressure of his first season performance is looming closer every day.

They’ve lucked into a window booth at Modern Diner mostly because it’s a weekday and because Jack had teased and cajoled and kissed and tickled Eric out of bed this morning so they could be at the restaurant by 7am. He’d gotten away with it because Eric’s been excited to eat here since Jack had told him it was the first diner in the United States to be accepted on the National Register of Historic Places. Jack had dug up the NRHP application online and suggested that Bitty could probably count a breakfast visit there as pre-semester research for his American history seminar.

“Do you think they’d let me tour the kitchen?” Eric asks now, tucking his hands around the diner mug of hot pot coffee and craning his neck to look back toward the extension where the kitchen is housed.

“You could call up the owner for an interview?” Jack suggests, nudging Eric’s calf with his foot under the table. He slides his foot out of his sandals and fits the arch of his right foot to the curve of Eric’s gastrocnemius. Eric frowns and wrinkles his nose at Jack, shaking his head ever so slightly over his coffee mug. But at the same time, he also leans into Jack’s foot, momentarily capturing Jack’s toes between his knees before Jack pulls away and puts his foot back on the floor under their table. So Jack counts it a win.

Everyone around them is busy with their food, with conversation, or the morning paper. And they’re not talking about anything that they wouldn’t have talked about at any point last year on a coffee date at Annie’s.

Jack resists the palpable urge to lean forward over the table and kiss Bitty’s censorious nose.

Eric’s been slightly on edge since their meeting with Erin. They’d stopped at the grocery store on the way home from the arena and made it halfway through the store before Eric had uncharacteristically pled tiredness and asked if they could just order something for dinner instead. He’d spent the evening baking cookies -- chocolate chip, white chocolate almond cherry, raisin pecan -- while Jack played Eric a few of his favorite episodes of _Vinyl Cafe_ and fiddled with the manual settings on his Nikon, continuing his experiments in Bittle’s Food Photography.

“You’ll just have to put some in the freezer and feed the team...or something,” Eric had said, as he loaded the dishwasher and set it running while the last sheet of cookies was in the oven. “Do you think Lester or Xavier would like some?” He’d met Xavier when Jack stopped to pick up his mail on their way in from the store.

“Go on,” Jack had said, reaching out to give Bitty’s flour-dusted hip a reassuring squeeze. “It helps you to feed people. Take him a plate.” And then he’d slid off the stool he was sitting on, watching, to dig out the package of still-shrink-wrapped Tupperware from the back of the cupboard so they’d have something to store what was left.

Jack’s pretty sure he knows what’s bothering Eric. But he’s also reluctant to actually ask because he doesn’t want to hear Eric say in so many words how intimidated he is by talk of _crafting a narrative_ and _getting out in front of the story_ and _coordinated media strategy_. Jack knows how bad it can get and also knows that Erin is one of the best he’s ever worked with. She’d been warm and funny and he thinks genuinely charmed by Eric. ( _Who wouldn’t be_ , Jack points out to himself, and then _Well, it took you the better part of a year, remember?_ ) But Jack had had his reasons that in retrospect had nothing to do with hockey and everything to do with being scared of making the same mistake twice.

Which is a fear he can no longer reach out and touch, that no longer feels tangible, because it’s so...unsubstantiated by any part of who Eric is in his life. But his brain didn’t know that, at first, and all it was interested in telling him was _danger danger Danger Danger DANGER._

The waiter -- Jack’s missed his name, though the guy introduced himself when he came over with the menus -- is back with their plates and ticks off the order as he sets the plates down in front of them: Jack’s leek and redskin potato omelet, Eric’s corn beef hash and eggs with a side of grilled corn muffin and maple syrup, more coffee and cream.

“So what do you want to do today?” Jack asks, as they dig in.

“Would you hate me if I said I wanted to go back h -- back to the loft and spend the day in my pajamas?” Eric asks, with an apologetic tilt of his head.

 _Not if I get to take you back out of them_ , Jack thinks but doesn’t say because public spaces.

“Wouldn’t hate you,” Jack says with a laugh. “But there’s a couple of books that came in for me down at the library. Would you mind if we swung by when they open so I can pick them up? If you don’t want to come along, I can drop you off first.”

Eric pokes at his hash before responding, and Jack has to stop himself from reaching out and pulling Eric’s free hand into his own. “Yeah,” he says, finally, “that’s fine.”

“We could stop by Wildflour on the way home?” Jack says. “You haven’t had one of their cinnamon knots yet.”

Eric smiles, though his shoulders are tight with worry. “Are you trying to bribe me with vegan baked goods Mr. Zimmermann?”

“You caught me,” Jack smiles back.

It’s when the waiter brings Jack’s change back to the table and hesitates, noticeably, while Jack’s sorting out $1s and $5s for the tip that Jack realizes a split second before it happens that he’s been identified.

“So...Jack Zimmermann, right?” the waiter asks.

Across the table, Eric freezes with his phone halfway out of the front pocket of his bag.

Jack slides his face into studied politeness and smiles up the server. “Yup,” he says. “That would be me.” He mentally crosses his fingers that his voice isn’t betraying the frustration he feels on Eric’s behalf, because he doesn’t want to alienate the local Falcs fans before he’s even played his first game.

“I read about you signing with the Falcs,” the guy says, approvingly, slightly awkwardly, “so, you know, welcome to Rhode Island?”

Jack feels like his smile is a little more genuine this time around as he folds a generous tip over and holds it up between index and middle finger for the waiter to take. “Thanks,” he says, meaning it, “my mother’s family is from New England so it feels like home.”

“I’m just gonna --” Eric is sliding out of the opposite side of the booth, gesturing in the direction of the restroom. “I’ll meet you at the car?”

Jack nods.

He's waiting next to the car in the rapidly-filling parking lot, flipping through his various updates -- email, text, Facebook, AccuWeather, the headlines from CBC and NPR -- when Eric comes out of the restaurant and crosses to the Honda. Jack unlocks the car and they both get in.

“I’m sorry,” Eric says, dropping his head back against the headrest and closing his eyes.

“For...?” Of all the things Jack has been waiting for Eric to say, _I’m sorry_ isn’t one of them. “I should be the one -- it happens, sometimes. He was actually pretty cool about it.”

“That’s why I’m --” Eric sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers as Jack turns the key and the engine turns over. Out of the corner of his eye, as he checks his mirrors, Jack sees Eric’s hand drop back into his lap. Then he feels the warmth and weight through the cloth of his own cargo shorts as Eric settles his palm against the curve of Jack’s thigh where he likes to rest it as they’re driving.

“I just didn’t -- I wasn’t expecting -- I didn’t think about it being so fucking _hard_ ,” Eric tries, stumbling over the words.

“...dating me?” Jack tries, tentatively, just to get the worst possibility out there first.

Eric cuffs him, sharply, behind his right ear.

“You know better than that, Jack Zimmermann. _No._  Jesus. Not _dating_ you. It's hard not...not being public about it. But also having the only option for being public about it really, _really_ public.”

Jack’s mouth is dry because this is what he’s been worried Bitty is gun-shy about, the public scrutiny. And it’s a part of Jack’s life that isn’t going to go away. It might get better, then worse, then better again, but until he retires -- and after, if his father’s post-NHL career is any guide -- he (and now Eric) will be one of those faces, one of those names.

He reminds himself to breathe.

“I’m --” he tries, but has to lick his lips.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Eric says, reaching up to cup his cheek awkwardly with the palm of his hand -- the angle is all wrong -- “no, Jack, don’t turn this into -- this _isn’t your fault_. It’s just...I’m just not used to...” he gestures with the hand that isn’t touching Jack, a motion that says all of this. “I was kinda hoping we could be just...Jack and Eric for a little while longer, like we were in Georgia.” He laughs, and Jack can hear the pain and the humor in equal measure. “It just feels ironic, you know? That I was so much less worried about being seen with you in public when we were down in Madison?”

“I’m sorry,” Jack apologizes, sure that he’s responsible for something, somewhere.

“Not your fault, Jack,” Eric repeats, rolling his head in contradiction against the headrest. “It’s not your fault the whole fucking industry is so homophobic no one else has been willing to come out first.”

“No, but…” he bites his lip and falls silent as they roll up to a red light.

“No buts,” Eric admonishes.

They drive the rest of the way to the public library in a silence broken only by the low murmur of the radio that Jack has left on at a nearly inaudible level.

As he pulls into an empty parking space across the street from the library and kills the engine -- they have about twenty minutes to wait before the library opens at nine -- Jack breaks the silence.

“Wanna get out of town for a couple of days?” he offers.

“Really?” Eric twists to look at him. “Where?”

“We could go out to the Cape?” Jack says, the idea taking shape in his mind. “The cottage is being rented out, now, until after Labor Day. But we could stay with Uncle Billy and Yannick? Or I could rent us a place?” It’s not like people in Wellfleet don’t know who he is, but there it’s a different sort of fame... _Oh, you’re Ali’s boy, there’s always someone around to remember. Didn’t you end up at Samwell on a hockey scholarship?_  or, _Hey, aren’t you Yannick’s nephew? Tell him Steve says hi!_

Eric smiles, and it’s the first fully relaxed smile Jack has seen on him all day. Jack will do anything to ensure that it stays.

“I’d like that,” Eric says, leaning across the gearshift to brush a kiss against Jack’s mouth. “You're sure your uncles wouldn’t mind?”

“Completely, totally sure,” Jack says. “You know they can’t wait to meet you, right?”

“Well, I can’t wait to meet them, either,” Eric says, settling back into his seat. “So I guess that makes us even.”

While they wait for the library to open, Jack pulls out his phone and sends his uncles a text.

 _Eric and I are thinking about coming out to the Cape tomorrow._  
_Maybe spend the night._  
_You free?_

The reply comes seconds later.

 _Yes._  
_The guest bedroom is available._  
_You want tickets to the show?_  
_Does Eric have any allergies, dietary needs/preferences?_  
_Apart from beer._  
_Pick us up some Crooked Current on your way._

He tips the screen so Eric can see.

Eric smiles again, “Hey! Do you think theatre types like cookies?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve decided to embrace the inwardly-focused couple-time that Jack and Eric seem to want at this point in their relationship. Which is awkward of them at this point because decisions need to be made about coming out. But I figure this mirrors the bubble effect of being a newly-formed couple (OH HAI MY GRAD SCHOOL SUMMER CLASS) so if you feel like I’m glossing over important external conversations (WHAT DID ERIN FROM P.R. SAY YESTERDAY) you are correct! We’ll play catch up after Bitty and Jack are done honeymooning about the place. 
> 
> I've mentioned it before but: [Modern Diner](https://moderndinerri.com/). #nom
> 
> The NRHP [report Jack found](http://www.preservation.ri.gov/pdfs_zips_downloads/national_pdfs/pawtucket/pawt_east-avenue-364_modern-diner.pdf).
> 
> [Vinyl Cafe](http://www.cbc.ca/vinylcafe/about.php%20) because it is ALL OF THE THINGS.
> 
> [Wildflour Vegan Bakery and Juice Bar](https://foursquare.com/v/wildflour-vegan-bakery-and-juice-bar/4d10f6f9c3dc3704dac43c74/menu) has been mentioned before but here is the link for ease of citation.
> 
> I've never had [Crooked Current Brewery](http://www.crookedcurrentbrewery.com/) but love the name! And now will have an excuse to go local brew shopping. Because fic.
> 
> [Pawtucket Public Library](http://www.pawtucketlibrary.org/) because I will always give a shout-out to local libraries.


	5. Thursday, 6 August 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Content Note:** This chapter is about Eric waking up from a bad dream about getting caught having semi-public / dubcon (dream Jack pressuring Eric) sex in a locker room. His brain is working through the bullying trauma and his worries about their relationship being closeted/going public. For people who wish to avoid such things, see you in next chapter...which is going to be beach and ice cream and family welcome on the Cape.

Eric wakes up from a nightmare just after three, his pulse racing with the adrenaline pumping through his system. It’s caused him to overheat and he can feel the prickle of sweat across his chest and on his back, making him stick to the sheets despite the cool night air circulating with the soft _whirr_ of Jack’s ceiling fan.

He lays unmoving for the space of a dozen breaths, forcing himself to inhale deep and slow, then exhale. He watches the movement of the fan above his head in the faint glow of Jack’s alarm clock. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see the rise of Jack’s shoulder under the sheet where he’s rolled onto his side in sleep. Eric had fallen asleep with his nose comfortingly pressed against the back of Jack’s neck, where his dark hair curls and smells of his shampoo. He must have gotten too hot and overheated, rolling away and kicking at the sheets which are now twisted around his legs.

He knows from previous experience that it’s not a good idea to let himself fall right back into sleep when he wakes up from bad dreams. When he drifts back off again, he just ends up back in the dream: running, trapped, searching, alone.

He pushes himself up onto his elbows. He can feel he’s half-hard from the fear and arousal, which happens sometimes and feels particularly unfair and uncomfortable in this instance. Because his bad dream had been about getting caught having sex with Jack in a locker room, somewhere, by angry teammates that in his dream were guys from Samwell even though his brain told him they were Falconers. And Shitty had been yelling at him for being embarrassed, and Jack wouldn’t talk to or look at him, and now his body is a confusing mess of fear and shame and desire.

He yanks at his edge of the sheets and manages to get himself untangled without waking Jack, rolling out of bed and padding quietly into the kitchen. The sleek refrigerator has a built-in water filter and Eric fumbles in the cupboards above the sink for a glass and then presses it under the backlit nozzle so he can flush the bad taste out of his mouth. The fridge gives a motorized  _humm_ and fills the tumbler with a cold stream of water.

Standing in the kitchen helps clear his head. No one’s walked in on him and Jack having sex. No one’s actually mad at him. There’s been no yelling. He’s not trapped in confining spaces with angry, larger bodies looming over him.

He blinks the afterimages from behind his eyes, lets his gaze roam around the apartment, settling on the wide expansive windows, the shadowy trees outside, the flickering blue and green and orange lights of Jack's modem and router, laptop and printer.

Water glass still half full, he goes into the bathroom to pee and splashes cold water on his face. He steals Jack’s towel on purpose so he can inhale the scent of Jack’s shampoo and soap again. Lemongrass and cucumber and mint, he thinks, making himself recall the ingredients list on the bottle. Clean skin, open spaces, arms that have never trapped him when he didn't want to be held.

When he slips back into bed, Jack rolls over toward him. “Everything okay?” He asks quietly, not sounding particularly alarmed but alert nonetheless. Eric is learning that Jack doesn’t really do half-awake. 

“Bad dreams,” he admits, letting Jack reach out and pull him close.

Jack nuzzles at Eric’s temple, pressing soft familiar kisses against Eric’s forehead as Eric tucks his face in against Jack’s chest. Limbs are awkward, facing each other like this, but Eric is starting to learn the tricks. He lets his left hand curl loosely in the space between their chests while he slides his right hand down Jack’s flank, from the ball of his shoulder over his ribs, the dip of his waist, the rise of his hip and ass, the back of his thigh to the warmth at the back of his knee.

“Do you want to tell me?” Jack asks, softly, into the silence. “When I was little, my mom used to make me tell her my nightmares. She said if you told someone, told them out loud, you took their power away.” Eric closes his eyes and concentrates on the way Jack’s hand is rubbing small circles against his back, underneath his shoulder blade. Jack’s touch is gentle and undemanding, though Eric can feel Jack’s dick pressed softly against his thigh. His body remembers Jack in the dream, remembers Jack crowding him up against the locker room wall, insistent, remembers himself wanting and worried. It hadn’t felt safe, and it hadn’t felt like Jack.

“Did it work?” He asks, finally, hearing the hesitation in his own voice.

Jack lets an almost soundless, thready laugh out into the space between them; Eric can feel warm breath ghosting across his cheek. “Sometimes,” he admits. “Nightmares are often ridiculous, eh? If you try to describe them, they turn into stories, not memories? But stories can still...be scary, I guess.”

Eric wonders what stories Jack finds scary, and almost asks. But Jack asked Eric a question first and Eric remembers the last time Jack made him promise to call if he had nightmares and how he hadn’t kept that promise. So he smooths his hand along Jack’s side a couple of times, to calm himself, marveling -- as he does every time -- how much of Jack there is to touch.

“You should always sleep naked,” he says suddenly, and Jack laughs for real this time, surprised and amused. It's obviously not what he's expecting Eric to say next.

“Oh?”

“There’s just so _much_ of you,” Eric says, not even trying to explain really.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jack allows.

Eric slides his palm around to the small of Jack’s back and shifts his hips forward, bringing them flush together, tangling their legs. All during June, He’d wondered how they would fit together, if it would be awkward, he wouldn’t know what to do with his legs or his arms or whether it would matter that Jack had inches on him. If their noses would get in the way when kissing. If his kissing technique would be embarrassingly inadequate. If he would freeze the first time Jack touched him, despite how much he wanted Jack’s hands, mouth, everything, because people had only grabbed him there in cruel jest before.

Those worries had been forgotten, in Madison, when on that first night Jack had asked _is this okay? are you okay?_ with each new touch and Eric had been able to respond each and every time with _yes, yes, God, please Jack, yes_ until Jack was satisfied.

“I was dreaming that we were having sex, in a locker room somewhere, I don’t know where, maybe Faber? But it didn’t feel like our locker room. We were -- you really wanted us to, even though I kept saying no, the guys would be there any minute, but you were … I mean, I know it wasn’t you. But in my dream -- dream-you -- you pushed me up against the wall of the locker room and I wasn’t wearing anything but my jersey. And I wanted to, but I knew other people were coming and we were gonna get caught.” He’s mumbling into Jack’s collarbone, hoping Jack can hear him because he doesn’t want to say it twice. “And we did get caught, by some guys from Samwell except they were your teammates, the Falcs, and everyone was shouting and I was trying to get away but you kept -- you wouldn’t talk to me but you wouldn’t let me go and Shitty was lecturing me about how I was stupid to be embarrassed --” he’s said all of this in one rush of breath and has to pause to haul fresh air into his lungs.

“Eric,” Jack says, quietly and seriously, pulling back so he can lay a hand along Eric’s cheek and theoretically look him in the eye although it’s still too dark in their bedroom to really see properly. “Eric. Je ne ferais jamais -- I would never --”

“I know, _I know_ , it’s not --” Eric’s shaking his head, hoping Jack can feel the movement against his open palm. “That’s why it was a bad dream. I _know_ you wouldn’t. So it all felt so _wrong_  ..." he hunches his shoulders in, feeling the lingering tension in his shoulders and neck. 

(Although, part of his brain presents to him, not _all_ of the dream had felt bad. At some point when Eric’s not so close to the terror of being caught naked by angry bullies he should probably go back and poke at the part about Jack propositioning him in the locker room, about how Eric in that moment had very much _wanted_ him to.)

He can hear Jack thinking in the dark.

“Jack,” he says, pushing himself up on his elbow so their faces are level.

“I don’t want you to feel like --” Jack starts, and Eric knows he’s thinking about yesterday, about that kid at the diner, about the day before that and the exhausting meeting with the Jack’s people. Knows Jack still doesn’t quite understand that Eric being here isn’t conditional.

Eric pushes gently at Jack’s shoulder until he takes the hint and falls back against his pillows, stretching out on his back, and Eric can sling a leg over his thighs and haul himself into a sitting position, somewhat awkwardly, straddling Jack with his knees pressed into the mattress on either side of Jack’s waist. He likes this position. Jack is comfortable to sit on, the width of his hips just enough to make Eric aware of the muscles on the inside of his own thighs. Aware of Jack trapped beneath him, warm and heavy and thick. He feels Jack flex his ass just enough to lift a little closer, then release against the bed.

There, but not demanding. Eric can almost hear him holding his breath and he wishes he could reach the switch for Jack’s bedside light and turn it on to really _look_ at Jack because he loves looking down into Jack’s face and seeing the wild vulnerability and incredulous hope that emerges when Eric does this. Like he’s realizing all over again that Eric is his.

Which, Eric thinks, is ridiculous, Jack is ridiculous, because this is _Jack_. Of course Eric is his.

His brain offers him, in a flash, the dream-memory of being pinned against the painted cinderblock walls of the locker room, of Jack’s body pressed him up against the cold immovable concrete, of the way it felt like and not-at-all like being shoved in the hallways at school and more like Jack checking him up against the boards, about the fact that now here he is -- here because he _wants_ to be -- in the privacy of Jack’s bedroom.

Jack lifts his hands, uncertainly, and then lowers them lightly to Eric’s thighs, sliding them up to his waist, pressing his thumbs into the groove at the top of Eric’s thighs.

“This okay?” he asks, and Eric wants to laugh but doesn’t because this is Jack worrying again.

“Yeah,” Eric affirms, clearing his throat, “yeah. Trust me. So much more than okay.” He presses his ass down against Jack, once, twice, feeling Jack twitch beneath him, feeling how inviting his body is, open to Eric’s touches. He settles his own hands atop Jack’s and slides his palms lightly up the length of Jack’s forearms, elbows, upper arms, shoulders, letting his body travel forward after his hands until he’s leaning over Jack with his hands braced to either side of Jack’s shoulders.

“Hey, baby,” he tries, and decides he likes the way the endearment lilts off his lips.

“Hey,” Jack echoes back. “Eric. What do you want?” 

Eric rounds his spine, stretching, shaking off the adrenaline itch, feeling the way his dick drags against Jack’s belly. Earlier his body had been interested when his brain was filled with _no no no_ and now his brain wants distraction, wants a reminder how good this can feel, and his body is only slowly, slowly getting on board.

“I want to stop thinking about people being angry at us,” Eric says, softly, into the dark. Spine up, spine down. Jack’s dick against the inside of his thigh, against the weight of his balls.

“No one _is_ angry at us,” Jack whispers back, his voice tangling with Eric’s as Eric leans down to brush a kiss against his lips.

“They will be,” Eric says, sadly. “You know they will be.”

“Those people aren’t going to matter, we won’t _let_ them matter,” Jack says, and Eric wonders whose words he’s echoing. Maybe Eric’s own. It sounds like something Eric might say, when he’s feeling braver than he has the last few days.

“Just...stop me from thinking, okay?” Eric pleads, with a thrust of his hips that brings them together in a drag of friction that feels a bit dull and distant but slightly less distant than the last thrust; his body is growing cautiously interested in the idea of sex.

“ _Mmm_ ,” Jack agrees, and Eric can hear both desire and affection in his voice. “That can probably be arranged.”


	6. Friday, 7 August 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I got in the promised ice cream and family welcome ... the beach walk is gonna have to wait until tomorrow because time for bed. Sleep well, dear readers! Sleep well.

On Friday morning, Eric makes pancakes for the four of them. While he works, Jack sits on the kitchen floor near his feet with Angus and Fergus flopped hopefully within ear-scratching reach. The kitchen of Billy and Yannick’s summer place is small but functional, opening out onto the back patio where they do the majority of their grilling and hosting during the season. There isn’t even a table big enough for four in the kitchen, and Uncle Billy’s laid the plates and cutlery on the table outside, under the big shade umbrella.

This will, in fact, be second breakfast for Jack. He was up at his usual time and went out for a run followed by a smoothie, then allowed himself the pleasure of kissing Eric awake in the spare bedroom under the eaves. It’s a tiny little space with angled walls, the ceiling too low for Jack to stand fully upright on except in the center. The bed is a mattress on a box spring on the floor in front of the northerly-facing dormer window, where a box fan blows sea breezes through to where an exhaust fan at the other end pulls the warm air out.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” Jack had said, sitting down next to Eric’s hip and leaning over to press a kiss against his bare shoulder.

“Gnh,” had been Eric’s response, as he rolled over and blinked up at Jack. “Time izzit?” They hadn’t gone to bed until past midnight the night before, since Billy and Yannick were on theatre time during the summer and Eric still hadn’t adjusted completely to Jack’s earlier hours -- it was hard to remember that less than a week ago, he was still working at Camp Oconee, regularly returning home after nine o’clock at night.

“Almost nine,” Jack said. “Want to shower with me? And then I can make us coffee while you make the pancakes.” Eric had volunteered to do brunch the night before while they were unwinding post-show with the beers he and Jack had brought from Rhode Island.

They had rolled into Dennis mid-afternoon the day before, after Yannick had already left for work, and Uncle Billy was hunched over an article draft at his cluttered desk in the corner of the living room. Following their disrupted night Jack had stayed in bed with Eric until he was ready to get up -- after the sun was well and truly up in the sky -- and then gone for a quick run while Eric threw together a batch of muffins and brewed a French press. They were on the road by eleven, and even though Jack was driving he put Bitty in charge of the music.

They would have arrived earlier, but Jack had decided on the spur of the moment to take Eric to lunch at the Hot Chocolate Sparrow in Orleans because he understood it was an ice cream sort of day. And he had been right, because Eric considered the sandwiches and then asked if they can make the grilled chocolate sandwich into a sundae with the maple walnut ice cream

“There are times,” he’d said to Jack by way of explanation, “when ice cream for lunch is what’s called for.”

“Did I say anything?” Jack held up his hands in surrender.

“I could feel you thinking it,” Eric said with a smile, pulling out his wallet as they reached the cash register. “Honey -- let me buy this time?” Jack’s aware that he’s the one with the job, right now (not to mention the family trust), and has been paying for most of their restaurant meals and groceries. So he’d put his wallet back into his pocket without protest. He realized, as Eric chatted with the cashier about their coffee roasts and requested a bag of beans ground for a French press, that they should probably talk about money at some point. But he doesn’t even know where to start. He’s always had what he needs, which he knows is a privilege, and it means he has no real grasp on what it might mean to Eric that Jack is comfortable considering what he has to be Eric’s too without condition.

“How long have your uncles been together?” Eric had asked, as they sat down at a tiny table with his sandwich sundae and Jack’s turkey-pesto panini.

Jack had had to think about it for a second, “Fifteen, sixteen years? They had their tenth wedding anniversary last summer, and they were together for a few years before that.”

“What was it like…having gay uncles growing up? That sounds wrong,” Eric had asked wistfully and then quickly backpedaled. “I mean...I don’t know. I just -- I never really knew anyone older than me who was openly gay? Before I came to Samwell. There was a couple at church, two women who lived together, but no one really talked about it -- not even them. And apart from that…It must have been nice, to...have someone to think, ‘I could grow up to be like them,’ you know?”

Jack blinked down at his lunch because he’d actually never thought about that in so many words, thought about what it would have been like not to have Uncle Billy in the back of his mind while he was living through the whole thing with Parse, getting over the whole thing with Parse, trying to decide what he wanted next. Even when his brain was needling him with all sorts of suggestions that he could never have what his Uncle Billy had, he’d known someone had it, somewhere. And it wasn’t an abstract someone or an abstract somewhere. It wasn't some celebrity claiming it would get better. It was someone in his family, less than an hour away in Boston.

“Yeah,” he finally said, “I guess it was, is…reassuring? To know someone’s…someone’s done this before, eh?”

“Yeah,” Eric had snorted, “it would have been nice to know I had that too, right?” Jack had put out a hand and covered Eric’s wrist. Eric had turned his hand immediately so that his palm slid into Jack’s, and Jack squeezed.

This morning, Jack thinks about that conversation as Eric flips pancakes and Yannick shuffles into the kitchen, giving Uncle Billy a pre-coffee kiss on the cheek and stepping over Fergus to pour himself a cup. Yannick’s asking Eric about his work at camp and his plans for the upcoming semester. The kitchen is comfortable and familiar, the pancakes smell amazing, and by mutual agreement no one has asked about statements to the press or public relations events.

Jack suddenly remembers telling Eric, back in May, that the Cape has always felt like home to him -- the most like home of all the places he’s ever lived. Maybe he -- they -- maybe they could buy a summer place out here, someday, and split their time between Pawtucket during the season and the Cape during the off-. Some of it will depend on what Eric does after graduation -- Jack knows he’ll want to work too, and may not be mobile -- but if they start talking about it now, when they both still have options, maybe…

“There!” Eric says above him, in a tone of satisfaction. “Now tell me y’all who’s ready for blueberry pancakes with their maple syrup.”

Not a single member of the family dissents.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why do I do flashbacks with complicated tense shifts? WHY?! Please bear with me and I'll fix any flubs I haven't caught tomorrow at breakfast. 
> 
> Previously mentioned but the [Hot Chocolate Sparrow](http://www.hotchocolatesparrow.com/virtual-tour.html) in Orleans, Mass.


	7. Saturday, 8 August 2015

Jack and Eric decide to stay a second night in Dennis, and then a third, because the weather is cooler here by a good ten degrees and Jack isn’t needed in Providence and Eric isn’t meeting Ransom, Holster, and Lardo at the Haus until Monday. So they decide to extend their vacation-within-a-vacation until Sunday _just because they can_ and it will be the better part of a year -- maybe more -- before they’ll be able to say that again.

It’s taken a good forty-eight hours for Eric to work the residual tension from the nightmare out of his muscles and his mind. He hasn’t had a reaction quite this bad since before college and he doesn’t have to look far to understand why although the explanation makes him irritable and frustrated and sad. He sees the worry lines at the corner of Jack’s eyes and has to fight against his impulse to smile and pretend and make Jack believe him.

So instead he lets Jack coddle him through music and food and sleeping in and shared showers and dozing with his head on Jack’s lap on Billy and Yannick’s sofa while Jack and his uncle talk politics and travel and academic publishing. He drifts in and out of conversation about Bob and Alicia’s evolving work with Syrian refugees, the long grind of peer review, the ins and outs of open access. Jack has an ecological history of the Cape in one hand, though he’s talking more than reading, and with his other he’s smoothing Eric’s hair away from his face in a gesture so comforting Eric silently begs for him never to stop.

And then, on Saturday morning, Eric wakes up to the rustle of Jack moving about their guest bedroom, and realizes he’s okay again. That he’s actually feeling brave, again, and excited about the idea of exploring this piece of Jack’s life that he hasn’t been a part of before.

He rolls over to see Jack pulling on his jogging clothes. “Going out for your run?”

Jack pauses, midway through pulling his t-shirt on, to look around, then rolls his shoulders and pulls on the hem to get the shirt all the way down before padding over to the bed.

“I was, but you’re awake? I can --”

Eric smiles and puts a sleepy hand out. “I’m good -- it’s good. I’m feeling -- thank you.”

Jack takes his hand and leans into a kiss. Eric likes how easy Jack is with his kisses, always giving them to Eric like there will be more where that came from, why save them for later?

“You wanna come with me?” Jack asks, “I told Uncle Billy I’d take Angus and Fergus and I was thinking of running down Chapin Beach Road. There’s a nice beach at the end.”

“Okay,” Eric says. He hasn’t actually been to the ocean yet, since they arrived. Now that he stops to think of it he realizes he hasn’t been to the ocean (in the sense of getting sand between his toes) since his first year at Samwell, when a group of them had road-tripped out to Nantasket.

So he rolls out of bed and pulls on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and his sneakers.

They jog together in the early morning light through streets empty of all except fellow joggers and dog-walkers. The majority of summertime residents are still sleeping the sleep of vacationers on no fixed schedule. Angus and Fergus are happy to keep to heel along the pavement, and Eric knows he’s slowing Jack down -- he really hasn’t kept up with regular exercise over the summer and _damn_ next week’s conditioning is going to hurt -- but Jack doesn’t say anything and keeps pace like they do this every day.

Maybe, Eric thinks, he shouldn’t hide in Jack’s apartment in the mornings and actually go out running with him. People work out with their teammates, right? He sees exercise buddies running across campus, through the arboretum, working out at the gym all the time. There’s nothing...nothing _telling_ about going out for a jog together.

It had been so much easier back when he hadn’t realized they were dating and the whole coffee at Annie’s, study sessions at the library, baking pie in the Haus kitchen, walks by the pond disguised as photography sessions were a thing he could do without worrying someone might get the wrong idea.

Back then, he’d kind of secretly (not very secretly) hoped observers _would_ get the wrong idea. Because _imaginary-_ dating Jack was as close as he’d thought he would come to the real thing. And if worst came to worst and rumors started Jack would just deny it because obviously Jack was straight. So there was no way these were honest to goodness actual _dates_.

Now that they’re actually dating -- now that they have a concrete plan for coming out -- he’s assessing everything that comes out of his mouth, every physical interaction, to determine whether a casual bystander would construe it as flirting. It's a cruel irony he's just going to have to live with for another few months.

 _But not here_ , he tells himself firmly, _not today._ Today he’s going to let himself be Jack’s boyfriend in (a mostly deserted) public and if someone sees then someone sees and if someone puts two and two together then someone puts two and two together and that’s what the firmly-worded press statement in a locked drawer in Erin’s office is for.

Yes. He can do this.

The beach is almost deserted, but for a few distant beachcombers chasing the outgoing tide. Jack nods that they can release the Setters from their leashes and Fergus waits patiently while Eric unhooks the catch, then goes surging after his brother down to the edge of the surf.

They sit at the edge of the sand to take off their shoes and tie the laces together. Then Jack tugs Eric back to his feet and they walk hand-in-hand after the dogs. Eric laces his fingers into Jacks and leans into his shoulder, smelling the familiar sweat of exertion that clings to him beneath the brine of the sea.

Jack finds a piece of driftwood and picks it up to toss for Angus, who seems more interested than Fergus in chasing sticks; Fergus is distracted by the gulls riding leisurely on the surf -- disdainful of his attempts to swim near.

They walk along the water’s edge, bare feet leaving side-by-side tracks in the wet sand that get drawn away as fast as they’re created by the slowly outgoing tide.

“So what do you think?” Jack asks, after they’ve walked out to the tip of the point and stand looking out into vast expanse of Cape Cod Bay.

Eric shakes his head, “It’s so different, is what I keep thinking. All the scrub trees and beaches and the ocean --” he sweeps his arm out toward the horizon where the arm of the outer Cape is all that stands between them and the wild open waters of the Atlantic. A tanker floats on the horizon, slowly making its way toward Boston harbor. “It’s so _flat._ Where I grew up, you were always heading up a hill or down into a valley. Here it’s... _empty_. However do people live with so much... _exposure_?”

Jack stands next to him, looking out toward where the morning sun is dancing on the gentle surf. Eric looks up just in time to see Jack shaking his head, slowly, to himself before he speaks.

“It’s...maybe you’re exposed, out here, but it doesn’t _matter_. The ocean and the wind and the sand don’t care who you are or what you do, eh? I think that’s what I like about the shore. It reminds you how unimportant you are.”

Eric looks back out to the water and thinks about Jack and the weight of expectations, and how heavy those expectations must be if it takes the force of an entire ocean to help him feel like who he is and what he does aren’t under scrutiny.

A particularly strong wave rolls in and washes over their toes. Eric is used to the freshwater of rivers and streams and the saltwater of the ocean bites at his skin. It’s sharp and clarifying.

He lets go of Jack’s hand and takes a few steps out into the surf. The outgoing tide swirls around his ankles and then his knees. A particularly high swell catches the edge of his nylon jogging shorts and before he realizes what’s happening he’s soaked to the groin.

The ocean water is _cold_ , particularly once he gets out passed the shallows where the outgoing tide will soon leave the sand exposed to the open air. The surface of the water, down maybe six inches, is comfortable, but the water washing around his toes is noticeably chillier.

Suddenly arms snake around from behind him and he lets out an undignified squeak of surprise as Jack catches him around the waist and pulls him through the water, his feet losing contact with the sand.

“Jesus! Fuck, Jack! _Cold!_ ” He protests, somewhat shortly but (he feels) to the point, as Jack swings him in a lazy arc through the water.

“Chicken,” Jack teases. “The water was reported at seventy yesterday.”

“Well it doesn’t feel the least bit like seventy now, does it?” Eric says, sharply, just to prove the point even though Jack’s right that once the surprise wears off the water isn’t inhospitable to swimming.

He fights to get his feet back under himself in the surf, and Jack lets him with a steadying hand under his elbow. Once he has his feet underneath him, Eric twists in Jack’s grasp and wraps his arm around Jack’s neck, letting the water buoy him up into Jack’s arms for a kiss. Jack tastes of his own sweat and the Gatorade he’s been making them both drink and the stronger salt taste of the ocean that tickles the back of Eric’s nose as he inhales.

Out here in the water, it doesn’t feel like they’re exposed and maybe he’s starting to get what Jack means about being insignificant because how important are two boys kissing in the surf compared to the drag and release of the water around them -- water that has spent millennia carving these beaches. Back on the shore, Angus is chewing on his captured stick and Fergus is lying beside his brother having given up on the gulls. The beachcombers might see them if they looked up but Eric finds he genuinely cannot bring himself to care for the first time since he got off the plane at Logan. And judging by the enthusiastic response he’s getting from Jack, he realizes that Jack has stopped caring too.

Yes. They can do this.

He adjusts his arms around Jack’s neck, feeling how steady Jack is braced against the tide, and then let’s the saltwater lift his feet off the sand with the swell and trough of the next incoming wave. He kicks, slightly, against the current and hooks his legs around Jack’s hips, crossing his ankles against the small of Jack’s back so he’s wrapped arms and legs around Jack’s torso. The better to kiss him with, he thinks with a grin.

“Well hey,” Jack says, grinning back against Eric’s cheek.

“Hey,” Eric says. “Thank you.”

“Should I ask what for?” Jack inquires, shifting his feet slightly to widen his stance against the water.

“Just...this,” Eric says, burying his face in Jack’s neck. “You’re a good boyfriend, Mr. Zimmermann, you know that?”

Jack’s arms tighten around him, though he doesn’t say anything, and neither of them let go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beach! Thanks to Burning_Up_A_Sun for the prompt which was (I summarize) they go to the beach and Eric goes swimming and gets cold because New England water temperatures eek! and then they have sex about it. 
> 
> Sex didn't happen right then and there (because, I mean, sand and saltwater and itchy and sunburn!) but maybe next chapter or the chapter after that is all I'm saying. I actually love writing sex normally and I'm not sure why these two are being so shy about on-screen sexytimes. 
> 
> Jack’s [ecological history](https://www.amazon.com/Cape-Cod-Environmental-Ecosystem-Northeast/dp/1625341091%20) book.
> 
> [High tide](http://www.boatma.com/tides/archives/tides.pl?type=calendar&location=Sesuit%20Harbor%20East%20Dennis%20Cape%20Cod%20Bay&month=Aug%20) near Dennis (Mass.) was at 6:31 on August 8, 2015. 
> 
> Me (to computer): Argh, no, I need _2015_!  
>  Wife: What are you doing?  
> Me: Oh, just trying to figure out the tide tables for their beach walk.  
> Wife: ...  
> Me: What?!  
> Wife: That's more research than I put into _my_ fic, I'm just saying.
> 
> [Chapin Memorial Beach](http://capecodonline.com/beaches/dennis/chapin-memorial/%20).
> 
> [Nantasket Beach](http://www.mass.gov/eea/agencies/dcr/massparks/region-south/nantasket-state-park.html).


	8. Sunday, 9 August 2015

They get back from the Cape mid-afternoon and decide to order dinner from Rasoi rather than go back out for groceries. Both Eric and Jack have had enough being in the car and enough interacting with other people for one day -- even just fellow shoppers at the Eastside Market. Going down to collect a delivery from Leon at the desk is about what they have left between.

“I can make you a grocery list for tomorrow?” Eric offers, as he’s cleaning out the fridge. In the living room, Jack sits on the couch assembling the Foodler order on his laptop. 

“Phew, this milk has gone sour,” Eric emerges from behind the refrigerator door with a dramatic grimace, holding the open milk contain before him. They hadn’t bothered to empty the fridge before their impromptu holiday and apparently not all of the food survived their three-day absence. 

“When do you have to leave in the morning? I could go first thing,” Jack offers, opening a new browser tab to Google grocery store hours. “But it looks like none of the stores around here open before eight.”

“Well there’s nothing for it,” Eric affects a long-suffering sigh as he pours the milk down the drain. “You'll just have get me up for a run, and then we can go shopping together before I leave.”

“You want to go running with me.”

“What, you think I can’t keep up?” Eric turns, empty milk carton in hand, and smirks at Jack. He leans back against the counter with his arms crossed, an eloquent eyebrow raised. 

“I think someone hasn’t exactly kept up his training over the summer.”

“Yeah, well,” Eric’s smirk turns into a grin. “Let’s just say I had other things on my mind.”

“Uh-huh.”

He shrugs, pushing away from the counter and tossing the milk carton in the recycling before going back to the fridge clean. “Coaches’ll whip me back into shape.”

“Said with the nonchalance of a twenty-year-old. Your body isn’t going to thank you.”

“I can’t believe I’m being lectured about not overdoing it by Jack Zimmermann.”

“I’m  _ lecturing _ you--” Jack says, finalizing their dinner order, “--about not flinging yourself heedlessly toward the next injury.” He’s been reviewing the order one last time, his mind only half focused on the words they’re tossing back and forth, until the words  _ next injury  _ leave his mouth. That’s when his brain chooses to present him with an all-too-vivid memory of Eric lying motionless and on the ice that final game of his freshman year.

_ Diminished _ had been the word that had come unbidden to Jack’s mind at the time. Despite how much the team teases Eric about his slight frame,  _ small  _ is never a word Jack's associated with Eric. Even when he thought his obsessive interest in Eric had to do with Eric being  _ annoying  _ and  _ loud  _ and  _ attention-seeking  _ rather generous and bright and sexy as hell. Eric has a way of making every space he inhabits come alive. Which is why his stillness on the ice had been so terrifying. Why turning to see Eric crumpled and unresponsive, seeing him carried off the ice in a stretcher, seeing him curled up in hospital bed for overnight observation, had sent Jack trembling for a dark and quiet corner where he could shake until the meds kicked in. Because that light and energy he'd come to associate with Eric had been...absent.

Eric must see Jack's expression shift because he's closing the door of the fridge and crossing the room to where Jack sits on the couch, lifting Jack’s laptop out of his lap so he can settle himself -- a familiar and grounding weight -- into Jack’s lap instead.

“Honey,” he says softly. “It’s  _ you _ I’m worried about.”

Jack, unsure of how to respond to that, just looks down to where Eric’s interlacing their fingers on his lap and shrugs. He’s long accustomed to the denial required to get out on the ice and do what he does, knowing that every game comes with the risk of a career-ending injury.

He just hasn’t had to think about that risk in relation to someone he loves since...well, it’s been awhile. And this is harder than last time because in the Q at least he could imagine flinging himself between Kenny and whatever harm was coming his way.

This season, Eric will be on the ice without him. He won’t be alone, Jack knows that. He knows anyone trying to hurt Bitty will have to get through Ransom and Holster first, Chowder, Nursey, and Dex second, and after all that if Eric needs even a single stitch whomever is responsible will have Lardo to answer...and that will all be before Jack shows up with an excuse not to keep his temper in check.

It’s still...terrifying.

And tomorrow morning, with Eric off to Samwell so he can help Ransom and Holster and Lardo air out the Haus and get things ready for tadpole orientation, it feels like the semester is beginning and Eric will be in jeopardy. It’s suddenly freaking Jack out, a little bit. 

He squeezes Eric's hands and shakes his head, unable to put into words what he wants to say. Eric looks at him narrowly but lets it go for the moment. 

Jack can feel the incipient panic lodged in his chest but fights is, and thinks he's tamped it down until after dinner when they're in the kitchen putting away leftovers and he's thinking about what he'll do tomorrow when Eric is up at Samwell.  It's at that moment his traitorous brain decides to present him with a scenario in which Eric is involved in a car accident on the way to Samwell and no one knows to call him or... 

He puts down the remains of the naan he’d been wrapping in tinfoil and leans over the counter to concentrate on his breathing.

“Jack?” Eric’s voice sounds a little distant in his ears, and he realizes that Eric’s asked him a question -- or responded to a question he’s asked? -- and Jack has missed it. He can feel his breathing is too shallow and forces himself to count to five as he sucks the air into his lungs and then from five back to one as he lets it out again.

“I’m okay,” he says, “I’m okay,” blinking his eyes open as Eric puts a hand on his chest in concern. He turns to look at Eric’s worried face at his shoulder. “I’m just --” he pauses, reaching for the right words. Anything he says about Eric’s vulnerability makes it sound like he doesn’t trust Eric can stand up for himself which he knows Eric has the strength and tenacity to do.

“It’s hard, thinking about…how much you’ll be away during the semester,” he settles for which sounds toothless but at least it doesn’t sound like he thinks Eric’s made of glass. “It’s...I didn’t expect to get used to this --” he gestures between the two of them “--so quickly.” The motion of his hand takes in their proximity, the remains of dinner, the apartment that he’d organized to accommodate Eric’s presence. The apartment that has already filled so readily with _Eric_ that when he’s sleeping away more nights than he’s here Jack is afraid he won’t actually be able to sleep as deeply or as long as he does when Eric’s heat-seeking form is pressed to his side, his back, his front, everywhere and anywhere. Reminding him even in sleep that he’s no longer quite so alone.

Eric hitches himself up on the counter top next to where Jack has gone back to fumbling with the tinfoil. “We’ll make it work,” he offers, a statement with an almost imperceptible lift at the end that turns it into a question.

Jack puts the wrapped naan in the fridge, takes the plastic containers of saag and malai kofta Eric hands him from the counter and slides those in as well. Closing the fridge he turns back to stand in front of Eric who spreads his thighs in their worn flannel pajama pants to accommodate him.

Jack lets his mouth turn up in a smile at the welcome, pushing his hips forward and curling his hands around the jut of Eric’s hips.

“Mmm,” Eric murmurs appreciatively, “I like this.” Sitting on the counter top he’s roughly the same height as Jack, able to kiss him without standing on tiptoe and without Jack leaning down to meet him. Jack closes his eyes and parts his lips just enough to allow Eric access as he presses kisses along Jack’s jaw, against the corner of his mouth, tugs at Jack’s bottom lip with his teeth.

Jack mirrors his movements in silent synchrony, a wordless orchestration of bodies that’s becoming as familiar as skating with Bitty on the ice.

Eventually, Eric pulls back. “Did you hear me earlier?” he asks, his head bumping into the cupboard door as he tries to put enough distance between himself and Jack so that his eyes can focus. “I’m meeting Ransom and Holster at ten. I mean, that’s when they’re gonna be shooting to make it to the Haus with their IDs activated and all. It’s not an exact science. Anyway, Rans and Holster and Lardo are the ones with the elaborate hazing rituals to plan. I think they just invited me because I promised them pie,” he winks at Jack. "I have to make sure Betsy II is still in working order after a summer of neglect."

“We’ll get you on the road by nine,” Jack says, “that should give you enough time, if you stay off 95 and stick to the local routes.” He has a feeling he’ll be learning all the local routes this year.

They’d talked, vaguely, back in July about coordinating schedules. About how often they could see each other. About how wonderful it is the technology exists to allow them to remain in near-constant contact when Jack’s game schedule and Eric’s Samwell obligations keep them apart for weeks at a time. They had been extremely adult about it, and rational, and Jack is certain now that the entire approach is bullshit and needs to be scrapped because he’s not going to survive without a regular infusion of this, of the way Eric’s hands feel pushing eagerly up under his t-shirt and the way Eric’s sweat tastes in his mouth, the way Eric’s breath catches against Jack’s lips when Jack reaches between them and awkwardly presses in, rubbing the back of his hand against Eric’s groin.

Eric arches into him, hips pushing forward, legs spreading wider, so he’s sliding off the edge of the counter top to press himself as close as he can against Jack’s belly.

“ _Crisse_ ,” Jack mutters, pushing forward in turn to meet him. “This okay?”

“Please?” Eric makes the word a question in turn so Jack answers it with a nod.

“Yeah,” he says, and then because Eric seems to like it when he talks French in bed, “Ouais.” Shaping the words with his lips and tongue against the shell of Eric’s ear. “Amène-moi au lit et baise-moi, s'il vous plaît,”

“Oh my _God_ that’s unfair, you’re cheating!” Eric says, breathlessly, half laughing, as Jack pulls him off the counter and then gives him a little push toward the bedroom.

“How is that cheating if I know you like it?” Jack asks, half teasing, half serious.

Eric, flushed, just shakes his head as he lets Jack steer him across the floor, toward the bed, pull his t-shirt up over his head, and tug the ties of his pajama pants loose before shoving those down as well. He doesn't stop until every inch of Eric’s skin exposed and inviting beneath Jack’s palms.

“I don’t know -- it’s not -- it’s just … _indecent_. Somehow. I feel indecent.” Eric’s blushing a hectic mottled pink across his cheeks and down toward his chest now, Jack can see it even in the mellow light of the bedside lamp as he flicks it on. But as he looks, Eric forces his eyes up to meet Jack's and Jack knows he doesn't mean indecent _bad_.  He steps back, clearing his throat, and strips his own shirt and pajama pants off (fair’s fair) before crawling onto the bed and reaching out to draw Eric down after.

“ _Hmmm_ ,” Jack pretends to reflect on the indecency of what they’re doing, letting his brow gather into a frown and his lips purse in thought. “Well, as long as you aren’t indecent for anyone except me,” he says with a grin, leaning down to capture one of Eric’s nipples lightly in his teeth.

Eric draws in a sharp breath in surprise, but arches up on the bed underneath Jack’s lips and teeth and tongue, urging him on to greater contact. Jack has learned in the -- _Jesus_ , it’s only been, what, less than two weeks they’ve been physically together? -- he’s learned this summer that once Eric decides he wants, he’s _all_ in. He's greedy and demanding and... _wanton_ stretched out naked on the bed under Jack’s gaze. Tonight, Jack lets himself look at Eric, kneeling between Eric’s legs, eyes lingering on Eric’s dick curving full and heavy against his belly, as shameless as the rest of him. He kneels forward, pushing a hand up Eric’s thigh as he goes, up over the curve of Eric’s erection, closing his fingers around it and tugging, smoothing, pushing up with his thumb and feeling the silky foreskin move under his fingers.

Eric makes small, approving noises, asking for more with a lift of his hips, fingers fisted in the sheets, neck stretched and head thrown back against the pillows as he leans into the building tension. Jack sees his nostrils flare and thinks it may be one of the sexiest non-sounds of pleasure Eric displays.

He pushes himself up and drops to the mattress along Eric’s right flank so he can press himself, rocking, against Eric’s hip while he keeps his hand moving: smooth, squeeze, dip down, back up, pulling just a little harder, then a little more.

“Là, tu es là...” Jack murmurs against Eric’s cheek as Eric pushes himself up into Jack’s palm. “Je t'aime, je t'aime tellement,” and he knows Eric doesn’t understand what he’s saying but it doesn’t matter because it’s nothing he hasn’t said before, said already too many times to remember. “You gonna come for me?” he whispers, and then Eric is doing just that. He’s twisting up and toward Jack, letting Jack pull the orgasm out of him until he’s fumbling between them, laughing, shaking slightly, slurring his words as he grabs Jack’s wrist like a vise  _stop stop stop_ and  _don't go don't go don't go_ all at once. “Good, it’s good, just -- just too much -- too much --” he’s trying to say as their fingers tangle together, slippery, and Jack let’s go, reaching up to trace damp fingers down Eric’s trembling arms, soothing. _Shh_ , he’s whispering, _shh. It’s okay, I’ve got you. You’re good._

“ _Very_ good,” Eric mumbles, with a drunken-sounding giggle as he presses a suddenly-sweaty forehead against Jack’s temple.

Jack turns his head to brush a clumsy kiss to Eric’s forehead, and then another. He lets himself rock gently against Eric’s, the pressure and fiction not enough but enough for now.

“ _Mmm_. Impatient,” Eric murmurs, rocking uncoordinated hips back toward him in response. Jack tries to pull back, apologetically, but Eric throws a heavy arm over his ribs. “Nope -- _no_ going _anywhere_  mis-ter,” he instructs, making the honorfic into two distinct syllables. “ _Like_ it that you want me.”

“Oh,” is all Jack can muster in response. “Thanks good.” It’s stupid and inadequate to his own ears, but Eric must know what he means all the same. Because he hums in satisfaction and wriggles in closer to finish what he started.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French translations:
> 
>  **Update:** Big thanks to akadiene and lethaltea and tsukiyuuki in comments for cleaning up my translations / offering suggestions. Y'all are so kind, and I've made the adjustments suggested (reflected below).
> 
> Ouais: "Yes." (informally)  
> Amène-moi au lit et baise-moi, s'il vous plaît: "Take me to bed and fuck me, please."  
> Là, tu es là: "There, there you are."  
> Je t'aime, je t'aime tellement: "I love you, I love you so much."
> 
> * * *
> 
> [Rasoi](http://indianrestaurantsri.com/rasoi/) for those of you who seem to be planning foodie tours based on this fic ;-)
> 
> So I'm thinking Eric'll decide to name Jack's Honda like he named Betsy and Betsy II because it's a think that Eric does. Suggestions? I'm taking 'em.
> 
> * * *
> 
> Oh, and I upped the rating to Explicit because on-screen orgasms. That's my rubric ;-). I'm kinda assuming that doesn't put anyone off. *kof*


	9. Monday, 10 August 2015

Here!  
I timed the drive  
37 minutes from your parking lot to the Haus

 _Not bad._  
_Less than it took me to get from Samwell to Boston._

Google Maps swears I-95 is 29 minutes  
Except “in current traffic”  


_Don’t be melodramatic._

I will be melodramatic if I goddamn want to  
My boyfriend will be 40 MINUTES AWAY ALL YEAR

 _Except when I’m not._  
_I was thinking._

?????

_I could buy you a car._

You could not buy me a car.

_Oooh. Punctuation. Scary._

  
Did you specifically wait until I was not sitting on the other end of the couch to suggest this??  
You CANNOT buy me a CAR

_Where are you?_

_I could buy myself a second car._  
_Isn’t that something professional hockey players are expected to do?_  
_And then I could let you borrow it for the semester._

I’m walking to Annie’s  
Ransom texted to say they were running late

I’m pretty sure NHL hockey players are NOT expected to drive a 2009 Honda Civic that was a hand-me-down from their relatives

_What are you getting at Annie’s?_

Hey Lardo says hi

_Hey Lardo :-)_

She’s on the bus but I’m talking to her on Twitter  
She says when are we meeting them for lunch tomorrow?

My appointment’s done at 10:50 so we can meet whenever after that.  
Have she and Shitty decided on a lunch place yet?

I’ll ask

  
Second coffee achieved!

 _More like third._  
_That iced latte from Wildflour was 20oz._

OMG I did not know I needed a churro latte   
BUT NOW I DO @_@

Honey you don’t understand how much caffeinated courage I need today  
You do realize this is the first time I have seen  
Lardo  
Ransom  
OR  
Holster  
Since they found out we were dating  
  

 _I have, indeed, sent you into a den of wolves._  
_Oh._  
_Wait._

* * *

  
I hate everything about my room  
I have decided

 _:-/_  
_Is there anything we can do about that?_

Not unless you have plans to move back into the Haus

_We would need a bigger bed._

  
#truth

 _I could bring one of the inflatable mattresses up?_  
_You could keep it in your closet._

…  
Are you...suggesting what I think you’re suggesting Mr. Zimmermann?

_If you won’t let me buy you a car._

I WON’T LET YOU BUY ME A CAR.

 _I’ll have to be the one driving up to you._  
_Rather than you coming down to Pawtucket._

 

OMG  
Have you seen these car emoji Jack? They are so adorable!  
  !!!

_Haha. Cute._

I thought you didn’t want to step on Rans and Holster’s toes this year?

_I don’t._  
_But they know I’d be there for you, not as C._  
_Anyway. Until the end of October no one but the guys living in the Haus could really know I was there. Or at least that I was staying over. So it’s not like I’d hang out at Faber._  
_:-/_

((hugs))  
I guess Farmer more or less lives here.  
But Jack you can’t be the one getting up an hour early to drive to Pawtucket every day.

_I probably can’t do it every day._  
_But we can work something out._

_What else would help?_

What?

_What else would help fix your room._  
_About which you hate EVERYTHING._

  
It is a terrible horrible no good very bad room

_I like your room._  
_Although I like Chowder’s room better._  
_Because that’s where you kissed me for the first time._

!!!  
OH MY GOD  
I never thought about that  
I mean that it’s now Chowder’s room  
Should we tell him it's the site of our first kiss?  
Do you think he’d be embarrassed or die of excitement?

_Judging by his reaction to the fact we’re dating?_  
_Both._

Oops...brb  
Pie

* * *

_How is old Betsy II holding up?_

Betsy, Jr is performing beautifully  
  
Thank you again, sweetheart

_I wanted you to have a nice birthday._

I hate to break it to you, Jack, but most folks’ idea of a nice birthday is a cake and card?  
I probably should have figured out then we were dating, huh?

_I forgive you._  
_I didn’t know we were dating either._

You have a point  


Lardo says we’re meeting at Border Cafe at noon for lunch.  
Do you know where that is?

_Yeah. Shits and I have been there before._  
_Bet it was his choice._  
_He likes the sangria._

Lardo wants us to go to The Awful Truth at the Brattle Theatre  
There’s a 3pm showing

She says screwball comedy  
Irene Dunne Cary Grant etc.  
Here, I’ll

_Sure._

<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028597/>  
Okay  
I’ll tell her it’s a go

_Want me to order tickets online?_

If you let me get lunch?

_Deal._

Okay -- Holster needs me to help him and Rans finalize the orientation day schedule  
Taddie tours!

_When are you getting home?_

Uh -- probably 4ish? 5?

_You want me to do anything to start dinner?_

You’re sweet  
Husk the corn?  
We can do it up in the broiler when I get there  
I’ll take care of the pasta salad.  


_I miss you and I love you._  
_Drive the speed limit coming home._

Ha. Ha.  
It’s a good thing for you I love you  
And that you’re such a good kisser

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on Ngozi's map in [this episode](http://omgcheckplease.tumblr.com/post/106126040102) I'm situating Samwell roughly between Norfolk and Walpole, Massachusetts somewhere on the Route 1 / 1A corridor. 
> 
> I gave Jack a [Honda Civic](http://www.kbb.com/honda/civic/2009/%20) because my grandfather used to drive an old manual one, late 90s I think? and my brother inherited it and drove it through college. That sucker lasted FOREVER and for all I know is still truckin' along making someone happy and getting them place. ***nostalgia***
> 
> Also because I think Jack would be like, “Why do I need a newer car? This one works.”
> 
> [Border Cafe ](http://www.bordercafe.com/)(Tex Mex). Best bean burros in Boston (okay, Cambridge).
> 
> Brattle Theatre off Harvard Square did, indeed, have [a screwball comedy series in 2015](http://www.brattlefilm.org/brattle/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/JulAug_2015_sm.pdf%20) and on August 11th they featured multiple showings of _The Awful Truth_.
> 
> Oh! And I owe the churro latte idea to [flour bakery + cafe](http://flourbakery.com/) in Boston who served it for their monthly special in June and OH. MY. GOD.


	10. Tuesday, 11 August 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the gap yesterday! The weather has been horrid here and drove me to an incipient migraine. I had to head to bed around 8:30p after an evening meeting for work.
> 
> In addition (household TMI!) our fridge/freezer crapped out this evening for the second time this summer, which means in the middle of a heat wave we have no way to make ice or keep food cold! Whee. Long story short, I **hope** to catch up with myself in the chapter-a-day schedule tomorrow, but I cannot garantee I will have the time for two chapters around sorting out the fridge situation. Never fear -- I know what the last three chapters will be and they WILL get written. Just possibly a day or two later than I originally hoped.

“Lardo says they have a table,” Eric reports as they stand on the first escalator on their way out of the depths of Harvard Square station. He’s on the step above Jack, both of them standing politely to the right so harried mid-day business traffic can pass them by. As they rise steadily toward the street, Jack presses himself comfortably against Eric’s back. Six inches below Eric on the moving steps, he’s just the right height to hook his chin over Eric’s shoulder and see where he’s reading Lardo’s text on his phone. Jack finagles his arm between Eric and his messenger bag, pulling Eric into a one-armed hug for the five seconds before they reach the top of the first escalator. Reluctantly, then, he lets go as they disembark to skirt the Jehovah’s Witnesses and foot traffic going in the other direction on their way to the second escalator that will deliver them to the surface.

When Jack steps behind Eric’s back on the second escalator, Eric waits for Jack to press up against his spine and then leans back into the touch.

Jack presses a kiss to Eric’s shoulder, through the thin fabric of his t-shirt. “Tell her we’re two minutes away,” he instructs as they step off the top of the escalator and emerge into Harvard Square.

They had left the Civic -- Eric keeps insisting it needs a name, but hasn’t found one that sticks -- in South Attleboro that morning and taken the train in to Back Bay station. They had arrived early enough that Jack was able to take Eric on an abbreviated tour through his uncles’ neighborhood off the Southwest Corridor Park before depositing him at a coffee shop to refuel while Jack kept his appointment with Marci. Then, with an hour to reach their destination in Harvard Square, Jack had continued playing tour guide as they walked through the Public Garden and the Common to Park Street before descending below ground and catching the T toward Arlington.

Eric hasn’t been to Harvard Square before, unless you count driving through on the bus to Bright-Landry for games, so Jack is the one who leads the way across the intersection passed the Coop and down the pedestrian throughway to Border Cafe. Before he can tell the hostess poised to seat them that they’re meeting friends, Lardo’s hand shoots up from a table near the back. “Thanks,” he says, “We’re meeting -- over there.”

“Sure thing,” the hostess says, attention already turning to the family group crowding through the entryway behind.

“You made it!” Lardo says, beaming, from behind her half-finished glass sangria. The waiter’s already brought chips and salsa and Shitty, sitting with his elbow touching Lards’, is looking blissed out on a similarly-depleted drink. He’s dressed in cargo shorts and grey t-shirt that reads “feminist as f*ck” in magenta across the front. Jack knows for a fact the t-shirt had been a Christmas gift from Lardo their Junior year so the message Shitty’s sending today is complex. But trending toward positive if Lardo’s body language is anything to by. She’s looking comfortable in a brightly-patterned sundress with her sunglasses pushed up to the top of her head. Jack realizes as he takes the chair between Shitty and Eric that it’s one of a handful of times he’s seen her in a dress outside of formal occasions.

“Yo, Bits! My man!” Shitty half-lunges across the table to offer a high-five to Eric, who offers his own palm for Shitty to make contact with.

“Hey Shitty. How’s it hanging?”

“Not bad, not bad,” Shitty settles back into his seat. “Lardo’s been helping me plan my _décor_.” He says it with the accent and a little flourish of the hand that isn’t stabilizing his drink.

Lardo rolls her eyes. “He means he’s taking some of the pieces I haven’t been able to store in my parents’ basement.” Like the nudes for which Shitty posed, Jack thinks, blinking at the thought of displaying photographs of himself on his apartment walls. Naked photographs. He … can’t really picture it. Maybe he’d understand if Eric were the one painting them?

The waiter must have been keeping an eye on the table because he’s there almost before Jack’s bag lands on the floor to take their drink order -- two more Sangrias -- and another basket of chips hot out of the fryer.

“Are you ready to order?” he asks.

“Give us a minute?” Eric’s looking at the menu with the focus he reserves for food, skating, and Jack. “Oh, but -- an order of guacamole first? Thank you.” He smiles winningly at the server. Not that Jack has ever treated waitstaff poorly, but when he goes to a restaurant with Eric he starts to feel positively ashamed for his transactional exchanges.

“I hear,” Shitty says, sucking down a visible quarter-inch of his sangria, “that you’ve taken over from yours truly the duties of Taddy Tour M.C.?”

“That’s me,” Eric winks. “I even got a playlist to match.” He closes the menu over his thumb, crossing his legs under the table so that his toe can brush Jack’s calf, and leans forward conspiratorially over his menu. “Don’t tell Ransom and Holster but…”

Jack makes eye contact with Lardo as she reaches for a chip and dips it in the salsa. He raises and eyebrow and she raises one back. They haven’t had a chance to talk recently -- or Jack’s been too preoccupied with Eric’s visit to make the time, maybe. He knows she and Shits have been hanging out more since mid-July and -- that they even took a weekend to visit his mother up in Brattleboro.

He still doesn’t know how to read what’s going on between them. He’s asked Eric, but Eric is no clearer. “I’d say they were sleeping together?” He’d said, at one point when they were talking about it mid-July. “But Shitty doesn’t seem like the kind to do … subtle? And if they were sleeping together, I can’t see him keeping it a secret. And Lardo ... “

“She didn’t … she didn’t make it sound like they were … dating?” Jack had said, thinking back to his conversation with her in Boston the day he left for Georgia. “She made it sound like they were really good friends when she was studying abroad, but then whatever she expected when she came back to Samwell didn’t … happen?” He’d shrugged. “It sounded complicated.”

Eric had smiled. “Not everyone lucks into a boyfriend as brave as you were, sweetheart.”

“It wasn’t bravery,” Jack had said, automatically. The back-and-forth already has a well-worn groove to it, and Jack suddenly had a vision of them having this same argument ten years from now when the kiss they’re arguing about is the first of thousands -- hundreds of thousands -- they will have shared.

In the restaurant he reaches without thinking about it and slips his palm under Eric’s hand on the table -- and Eric turns his palm in to accept it, easily, interweaving their fingers and squeezing Jack’s hand without interrupting the rhythm of his conversation with Shitty.

 _You okay?_ Jack tries to mouth to Lardo. She just rolls her eyes at him and shrugs. He frowns gently at her, but doesn’t pursue it. He’ll have to catch her sometime when she’s more sober and Shitty isn’t declaiming all over the table.

With the hand that isn’t holding Eric’s he opens his menu and considers which burrito he wants to order. It’s … he fishes around for a word. Marci had been pushing him that morning to use specific words for both the shape of his worries and the things that he values about his relationship with Eric, his work, the other parts of his rapidly-changing life. This afternoon feels _nice_ , he thinks. A tepid word. It feels _homey_? Better. There’s something _enduring_ about his friendship with Shitty and Lardo, he thinks, and something warm and solid about the way the four of them fit together in an easy quartet of friendship.

Jack doesn’t hang out with many people -- formless social time has a way of kicking his anxiety into high gear. But he’s never been able to not hang out with the force of nature that is Shitty, and Lardo’s always been the uncomplicated best friend he’d always longed for but never found … until this tiny art major marched into the locker room with her clipboard in hand and he knew she was someone whose respect he wanted to earn. But not in the complicated “I want you to like me and suck my cock” way he’d felt around Kenny. And -- miracle upon miracle -- Eric seems to feel much the same way about both Lardo and Shitty, wanting them to be a part of his -- of _their_ life -- not on some sort of sufferance because they’re Jack’s friends but because they’re his friends as well.

The waiter turns up at his shoulder to start taking their orders around the table, Jack folds his menu to hand it up, along with his request for the bean burro, extra guacamole, and lets himself imagine this is the first of many leisurely double dates the four of them will share.

He catches Eric’s eye, and Eric blows him an air kiss before laughing at something Lardo’s said about the incoming Taddies.

Yeah, Jack thinks. Worth it. They’re all three of them worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Bright-Landry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bright-Landry_Hockey_Center) is Harvard's hockey arena.
> 
> [Southwest Corridor Park](http://www.mass.gov/eea/agencies/dcr/massparks/region-boston/southwest-corridor-park.html). I head!canon Jack's uncles living along the park between Back Bay and Massachusetts Avenue stations on the Orange line. Near Titus Sparrow Park. 
> 
> **UPDATE 8/18/16:** I took some photos of Uncle Billy  & Uncle Yannick's Boston neighborhood today and posted them to Twitter:
>
>> For folks reading my [#OMGCP](https://twitter.com/hashtag/OMGCP?src=hash) [#fanfic](https://twitter.com/hashtag/fanfic?src=hash)...I was in Uncle Billy & Uncle Yannick's neighborhood this rainy Thurs morning! [pic.twitter.com/LpF1rBaXag](https://t.co/LpF1rBaXag)
>> 
>> — AnnaClutterbuck-Cook (@feministlib) [August 18, 2016](https://twitter.com/feministlib/status/766248566230745088)  
> 
> 
> [Shitty's shirt](http://store.feminist.org/thisiswhatafeministlookslikeblacktanktop.aspx), only I made it a tee not a tank top. Although I can picture him in the tank top as well! Just at kegsters not on his way to an art house cinema with a sun-dressed Lardo ;-)
> 
> [Brattleboro, VT](http://www.brattleboro.org/) is where I put Shitty's mom. A nice granola-y town (bonus: my wife went to college nearby).


	11. Wednesday, 12 August 2015

“Maybe I should make cookies too?” Eric looks down at the raspberry-peach pie cooling on the rack. “What if one of them has a fruit allergy. You did really ask about allergies, didn’t you?”

“Bits!” Jack comes back out of the bedroom where he’s been rummaging around for an acceptable shirt to wear to dinner at the Martins’. Eric can hear the eye-roll even without looking up. “For the third time, yes, I did _actually_ ask George on Monday whether she or Joelle _or Emmy_ have allergies and the answer is no, they do not. They keep a vegetarian household, and -- I further clarified when you asked me to -- they do eat dairy, eggs and honey. But no allergies.”

“Okay, yes, right. You’re right,” Eric twists the towel in his hands and tries to stop himself from getting out a mixing bowl to start a batch of vegan gluten-free, nut-free date bars _just in case._

“Hey,” Jack says, crossing to where Eric is standing next to the counter immobilized by conflicting impulses. “Hey, _Éric_. What is it?” He lays a hand on Eric's arm.

Eric rolls his eyes and swats Jack with the towel. “Don’t you try to sweet-talk me with your Québécois, young man, I am onto your tricks.”

“I know,” Jack smiles, putting his hands on Eric’s hips and pulling him in for a kiss. “But you’re gonna let me get away with it anyway. So tell me what’s bugging you. I could feel the tension from the back corner of the closet.”

“Ugh,” Eric drops his forehead against Jack’s shoulder. “It’s nothing it’s stupid.”

“Uh-huh,” Jack says. And then the fucker _waits_.

“What if your boss doesn’t like me?” Eric finally, reluctantly mutters. “What if her _wife_ doesn’t like me? What if their kid -- who apparently thinks the sun rises and sets in your general direction -- takes one look at me and starts bawling?”

Jack has the gall to _laugh_ , which Eric thinks is monumentally unfair. But he follows the laugh up with, “Why wouldn’t they like you?” like he honestly can’t think of a reason so Eric finds it hard to hold a grudge.

He leans back in Jack’s arms to glare anyway, just for form’s sake. “Don’t tease me, mister,” he says, reprovingly. “George is _scary_. And her wife is _Southern._ She’ll see right through me, know all my weaknesses, all my horrible secrets.”

Jack grins and leans down to give Eric another kiss. “I’m pretty sure they both already think we’re the most adorable couple they’ve ever met. I’ve never felt so much like I had older sisters. Go on. Change into that shirt you wanted to wear so we can get going. I know you don't want to be late.”

* * *

The Martins live a ten minute walk from Jack’s apartment, on a quiet street off East Avenue with mature trees and modest homes built in the early decades of the twentieth century. George and Joelle’s home is a two-story bungalow with a generous and inviting front porch, half-hidden under the low-hanging branches of a twisting cherry tree. There’s a porch swing, Eric notes approvingly as they climb the steps to the screen door.

“Hello?” Jack calls, rapping on the wood frame of the door.

“Come on in,” a woman’s voice calls from somewhere beyond Eric’s line of vision. It doesn’t sound like a voice he’s heard before so it must be Joelle.

They step into a front room that looks to be a living room -- probably originally a parlor -- with overstuffed armchairs, a coffee table, and a sofa surrounded by an assemblage of bookcases and family photos and framed artwork on the walls. Eric takes all this in at a glance as they step over the scatter of infant toys and pass through the dining room with its formal table covered with a scatter of papers and stacks of folders and an open laptop. Jack’s been here several times since June -- to meet with George and once to take care of Emmy so George and Joelle could go to a PawSox game -- so Eric lets him lead the way into the kitchen.

Joelle’s at the stove tending what looks and smells to be a lovely rice pilaf. She half turns when they enter, to wave a hand in greeting. “Jack, so good to see you! And you just be Eric--” Eric steps around the central island to offer his hand. He realizes as soon as he hears it how he’s been waiting for the Atlanta drawl. And even though it’s tempered by her years in New England feels the way his body relaxes at the sound of home.

“It’s a real pleasure,” he says, warmly. “I’ve heard so much about you.” And he has, too, in the bits and pieces Jacks tends to share about his days.

Joelle laughs, and winks. “Well,” she says, “I do hope it’s been complimentary.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” Jack responds mildly. And Eric realizes with genuine pleasure and gratitude that Jack’s presence and body language is as relaxed as Eric has seen him in Pawtucket outside of their apartment. He must really feel among friends. 

“Jack!” George calls from outside, through the back door, where Eric can see her setting the picnic table with its red-and-white check cloth. There’s a small child on the grass near her feet, dressed in a bright yellow romper and white hat to keep off the sun, waving some sort of plastic toy in the air. “Come help me move the table into the shade.”

Jack puts the pie he’s been holding on the counter and goes out into the yard.

“Need any help?” Eric asks the chef, because it’s always polite to ask, but Joelle’s already waving away the offer.

“Go on,” she says. “You’re our guests tonight. Go sit and enjoy yourself. There’s a pitcher of sweet tea on the table.”

“ _Now_ things are gettin’ serious,” Eric says with a grin, following Jack out the door.

In the end, it’s Eric who ends up helping George move the picnic table because Jack’s been waylayed by Emmy demanding to be picked up -- squawking her outrage at being ignored and rocking forward on her chubby little legs with her arms raised.

“But Emmy,” Jack says to her seriously, lifting her up and swinging her gently until she squeals with delight. “Your mama asked me to help with the table.”

“I got it,” Eric says, skirting Jack crooning at Emmy to join George at the table. “Where do you want to move it?”

George nods over her shoulder at the shade under two large maple trees that hang low over the back fence and they silently _one-two-three-lift_ the lawn furniture across the yard with the dishes and cutlery and jug of sweet tea balanced neatly on top.

“Thank you,” George says, brushing off her hands on her shorts. “Now, can I pour you some tea? And it’s nice to see you again, Eric. We don’t usually put our guests to work quite so quickly in this house. But you can see there’s no hope for it once Emmy’s got her hands on Jack.”

Eric accepts the tumbler of ice-cold tea -- brewed to perfection, he notes with the first sip, bless Joelle’s heart -- and turns to look at Jack who’s now tossing Emmy up in the air above his head accompanied by her little shrieks of delight.

Jack catches him looking and pauses, smiling. “What?”

Eric shakes his head. “How do you know what to do?” He asks, half amused and half genuinely curious.

“Babies seem to love you,” he elaborates, when the crease in Jack’s brow deepens. “I mean, when we were down in Georgia in July, Caroline fell asleep on you almost instantly. And now Emmy. How do you do it?”

Jack laughs, “But kids are easy.”

Eric laughs himself, in surprise, nearly choking on a mouthful to tea. “Kids are _not_ easy!” He looks to George for support, but she just shakes her head with a smile, slipping her hands into the pockets of her shorts and leaning back against the end of the picnic table, clearly amused by the exchange. “How are kids easy?”

Jack looks at him with a baffled expression. “Don’t you have something like three times as many cousins as I do?”

Eric rolls his eyes. “Being _around_ them is no guarantee that I _understand_ them.”

Jack shrugs. “Kids...the things they want are pretty self-explanatory, eh? They want you to hug ‘em and make sure they have food when they’re hungry and pay attention when they want to show you something. I can do all of that. It’s...uncomplicated.”

Eric, who’s never thought of children as uncomplicated -- who has, in fact, thought of them as vaguely terrifying and mystifying, full of needs he has no idea how to begin meeting -- finds himself half-convinced by the force of Jack’s own convictions. He stares at Jack, suddenly, realizing they’ve never talked about children. About whether either of them wants to have children. Oh, god, he has no fucking idea whether or not he ever wants to have children. What if Jack already knows he wants to be a dad? What if --

“Dinner’s served!” Joelle interrupts Eric's incipient panic by coming out of the house with a dish of rice pilaf topped with grilled portobello mushrooms.

Jack carries Emmy over to the table and puts her in the infant seat like he’s done this a hundred times before, and Eric tries to focus on the ease of Jack’s spine and the comfortable set of his shoulders. Something about the Martin’s household is putting Jack at ease and maybe it’s kids but it could also just be Emmy specifically. Or maybe knowing that everyone at the table tonight knows they’re together and is _happy_ for them (or, in Emmy’s case, is simply too young to care). Maybe Emmy reminds Jack of Charlotte and Helena when they were younger. Maybe Jack isn’t any more certain about what he wants for the future than Eric is. Maybe that’s something they can figure out together.

“Take a seat, Eric,” Joelle is saying, and Jack is patting the bench next to where he’s already seated. So Eric swings a leg over and slides in next to Jack so they’re sitting side by side -- a matched pair across from Georgia and Joelle like this is _normal_. Like they're all grown ups leading unremarkable grown-up lives and there's nothing remarkable about the fact that Emmy has two moms and Jack has a boyfriend and they're all about to have dinner together.

"So tell me, Eric," Joelle says, passing him the bowl of garlic-roasted chard, "how's my alma mater treating you? What classes are you taking this semester?"

George and Joelle are good people, Eric thinks. Good people to have in their corner.

* * *

Eric realizes, as he slides into bed next to Jack that night, that he wants to ask Jack for something.

And asking Jack for this particular something is hard. Hard because he’s been trying to be _so good_ and brave about starting his junior year and moving back into the Haus and part of him is really excited about his classes and starting pre-season training and seeing all of his friends again … and part of him is curled up tight in a fierce little ball of denial that this is the last night of _this_ that he has: the last night of really _living here together_ with Jack, sharing a daily routine, until...until probably _next summer_. And even then, circumstances could change. He could need to get a job or take an internship somewhere too far away to commute.

There are so many unknowns.

And to be honest, he’s feeling a little nauseated with all of the stress of rapid change and not wanting to lose this togetherness before its even barely started. This isn't even going back to last year's status quo because last year Jack was on campus, across the hall, in the library, walking him to class and coffee, falling asleep next to him on the bus -- Jack was  _everywhere_ and unattainable. Now Jack is  _his_ and will soon be much further away much more of the time than he's been during the school year since Eric started at Samwell. Since before Eric realized how much he paid attention to the  _whereness_ of Jack. 

“...Jack?” He asks, rolling over on his side and sliding a hand over Jack’s bare stomach. Jack lowers the book he’s reading and turns his head to look at Eric through his reading glasses, blinking endearingly as he focuses.

“Mmm?”

“I was wondering --” Eric chews on his lip, running his thumb across and around the dip of Jack's bellybutton, enjoying the slight swell of Jack's belly and the soft dusting of hair above the waistband of his boxers.

“Yeah?” Jack prompts when Eric doesn’t complete the sentence. He twists to put the book on his nightstand, not bothering to stick in a bookmark, and rolls back to focus his attention on Eric. Eric lets his hand ride with him, enjoying the bunch and release of muscles as Jack moves. _Mine_ , he thinks happily.  _Mine, mine, mine._

“What is it, Bits?”

“It’s just...I was wondering if maybe you’d like to stay at the Haus tomorrow night.” Jack is driving him up to Samwell with his suitcases, the things he isn’t leaving here. He’s definitely leaving some things here. But he suddenly can't bear the thought of Jack dropping him off and just ...  _leaving._

“I thought...” Jack hesitates, then says carefully, “I thought you might like some time to settle in?”

Eric slides his hand up to Jack’s chest, feels the steady, reassuring  _thump-a thump-a_ of Jack’s heart beneath his ribcage. He takes a breath and forces himself to rephrase the question the way he actually meant it: “I’d really...I’d really like it if you could stay. Tomorrow night. This feels...hard. It’s hard to have this and then have to go back. Except without you there. It feels...it feels like --” he blinks away the tears that prickle at the back of his nose and the corner of his eyes, damn it, “-- it feels like going backward. And I just want -- I think I just need you there. At least for the first night?” He hates how needy his voice sounds. Hates how much he hates the need in his voice, knowing as he does that Jack won’t be angry at him for asking.

“I’d like that,” Jack says, softly, immediately, without the slightest hesitation, and Eric looks up to see the relief in Jack’s eyes. Maybe he wanted this, too, but wasn’t certain how to ask. Thought he shouldn’t ask.

They’ll get better at this.

“Okay,” Eric agrees, nodding against the pillow. “That’d be -- thank you.”

“I’ll stay as often as I can and -- and you want me to,” Jack says, seriously, and Eric feels something in his chest loosen. They can do this. They can hold on and someday it’ll stop being quite this complicated, maybe, and instead just be easy. What they wake up and do everyday. Be together.

He sighs and closes his eyes and Jack turns out the light and pulls Eric into the circle of his arms. Eric’s pretty sure he could get used to that. He’s pretty sure he already has.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "sun rises and sets in your general direction" line is loosely stolen from [Sylvia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_\(play\)) a stage play about a man who introduces a dog into his marriage and the chaos that follows. The dog (personified in the play by an actress) ADORES the man and is characterized at one time as believing the sun rises and sets with the man's presence or absence. I couldn't find the precise line, but wanted to cite the play nontheless. 
> 
> I had no idea Eric was going to have a mini-freakout about parenting until it happened but I decided to leave it in because, you know, sometimes we have those little moments of panic in life and relationships.
> 
> Fridge update: Repair person supposed to be showing up tomorrow morning! Fridge on the highest "cold" setting hovering around ~45 which is still too high but hopefully will keep much of our food in okay shape until problem is solved. Hallelujah for responsive landlords \o/.


	12. Thursday, 13 August 2015

Jack pulls up in front of the Haus and puts the Civic into park, killing the engine and looking across Eric in the passenger seat toward the heat-scorched yard and the front steps of what used to be as close to home as he had outside of the family cottage.

He hasn’t been back on Samwell’s campus since May and it feels disorienting to be here now, though not as painful as he’d feared it might be. So much has shifted in the past ten weeks that his years at Samwell are already starting to feel like they were the experience of...not someone else, but a version of himself whose priorities and expectations have since been scrambled and reordered in ways that former self had never consciously anticipated.

He thinks of what Eric said last night, _it feels like going backward_ , and realizes that’s how he would feel, too, if after the summer they’ve had for some reason he had to return here full-time. It’s uncomfortable and a little sad. He remembers how good it felt to be a student here, to play hockey and study at the library and make friends who had lives outside of training. Even when they irritated them for failing to take the game as seriously as he thought they should. It throws him that this doesn’t feel like the place for him anymore.

Except, of course, that Eric is still here, for another two years. And where Eric is will always feel like a version of home.

“You want help with your bags?” He asks, reaching to unbuckle his seatbelt.

“Honey, wait --” Eric’s looking down at his phone. “Holster says Nursey and Dex are here? Do you -- do we want them to know you’re dropping me off?”

Jack shrugs, “They know you’ve been in Pawtucket with me, right?” The only members of Eric’s team they’ve officially told (and sworn to secrecy until it’s no longer a secret) are the current Haus residents -- Ransom, Holster, Chowder, and Lardo -- plus Farmer, who’s an honorary team-member and Haus resident in part because everyone knows anything Chowder knows Farmer will know sooner rather than later. It saves everyone a lot of trouble just to treat her up-front as part of the inner circle.

“I’ve posted a few pictures on Facebook and Twitter so, yeah,” Eric agrees.

“Then I’ll help you unpack. We don’t have to explain what the air mattress is for,” he smiles and reaches for Eric’s hand -- far out of sight of anyone being nosy from nearby windows -- and squeezes. Eric gives him a brief smile.

“Let’s go then. Ransom’s bringing the taddies by at ten and I want your ass on the other side of campus so I have the boys’ full attention while I lay down the law.”

Jack snorts.

Chowder’s unpacking in Jack’s old room when they reach the second floor, and Jack lingers momentarily in the hallway, torn between commenting on the pervasive turquoise theme -- Chowder appears to have acquired even more Sharks gear over the summer -- and pointing out that Chowder’s standing approximately in the spot where Eric had been standing when Jack first kissed him.

“Jack!” Chowder sees him and drops the armload of clothes he’s in the middle of unpacking on his bed. “I didn’t expect to see -- that is,” he cranes his neck to peer around Jack’s shoulder. “Hey Bitty!”

“Hey Chowder,” Eric calls back over his shoulder as he unlocks the door to his room across the hall and drags the suitcase he’s brought with him into the room. The other suitcase, empty, is tucked in the back of the bedroom closet in Pawtucket and at least half of the clothes Eric brought with him from Georgia are still on the shelves where Jack had cleared room.

Jack isn’t complaining.

“Are you helping Eric move back in? That’s so sweet of you!” Chowder says, and Jack thinks that apart from Eric, Chris Chow may be the only member of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team capable of telling someone they’re being sweet with one hundred percent sincerity. “You do know that Dex ‘n Nursey are --”

“Yeah, we got it,” Jack says, shifting the duffel bag with the inflatable mattress in it under his arm.

“Okay, cool! I just --” Chowder nods. “I just want you guys to know if you ever need --” he glances from Jack to behind Jack’s shoulder again and Jack turns to see Eric leaning in his own doorway listening to their exchange.

“Chowder, honey,” he says. “You are the sweetest. The best thing you can do for us right now is to treat Jack spending time here as _normal_. If everyone at the Haus treats Jack being here like it’s no big deal, it’ll help everyone assume he’s just hanging here with his friends. Which he is.” He leans a little heavily on the final sentence. 

Chowder sucks on his braces like he does when he’s thinking and narrows his eyes at Eric and then Jack in turn. “Uh-huh,” he says. “Like all of us thought you two were just ‘hanging out’ --” he actually uses air quote “-- last spring.”

Jack laughs, startled. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Eric throw up his hands, “I give up. I give up!”

Chris actually leans forward and pats Jack on the forearm. “We got this,” he says. “Holster even had a Haus meeting about it this morning.”

Jack realizes the situation is rapidly escaping his grasp let alone his control. “Holster.”

“We had to run through scenarios. Ransom had a spreadsheet -- you know his spreadsheets. He and Holster had a list of questions people ask the friends of celebrities when they’re trawling for information about their relationships. And they made us run through how we would answer them.”

Jack blinks. “Um.”

“Well,” Eric says, clearing his throat. “That’s -- very prepared.”

Chowder nods, looking from Jack to Eric and back again. “Cait was there too because--”

“--honorary Haus resident,” Eric and Jack both agree, automatically.

“Right.”

“So,” Eric asks, cautiously, in the tone of someone who isn’t quite sure he wants to know but feels he has to ask. “Did any of these scenarios cover…Jack staying the night? For instance.”

Chris grins. “The Haus is open to all members of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team, past and present,” he says. “Once a member, always a member. We often let alumni crash on the couch after they’ve come to a home game or swing by for a kegster. Better to sleep on the couch than be on the road after drinking some of Shitty’s tub juice, right?”

* * *

After leaving Eric to his tadpole duties, Jack parks the car in one of Samwell’s visitor lots and takes a leisurely walk around campus. This early in August, it’s still mostly deserted except for the student athletes and the kids who never went home for the summer because of campus jobs or summer classes. He goes to the library and browses the new book wall, then to the campus art gallery that’s cool and quiet and smells of paint and clay. He knows Lardo has studio space somewhere in the building, and thinks about asking if he can go looking for her, but figures she’ll be busy with the guys today. He’ll remember to ask about her current projects the next time he sees her, or swing by her studio on his next visit to campus.

Eric’s asked him to stay tonight, but he’s babysitting Emmy tomorrow evening so Georgia and Joelle can catch a movie. And Eric will be busy all weekend and into the following week with conditioning and orientation activities. They should probably figure out how often is … too often for Jack to visit.

He glances at his watch and then ducks into Annie’s for an iced coffee and an egg salad sandwich that he takes to a bench under the birches that edge the Pond. It’s a warm summer day, but the humidity is low and in the shade it’s tolerable. He eats his sandwich, throwing a few shreds of crusts to the greedy Canada geese that strut across the grass like they own the place (and they do).

He pulls his phone out of his camera bag with the hand that isn’t holding his sweating iced coffee and thumbs it on to a short run of texts from Eric:

 _OMG Tango is going to be the death of me_  
_that boy is even more instructive than Chowder_  
_*inquisitive_  
  
_Sweetheart I have a favor to ask_  
_We forgot sheets for the mattress_  
  
_Would you run to IKEA this afternoon?_  
_I’d go with but Coach Hall has us in a meeting starting in … 12 minutes_

 _Sure_ , Jack texts back. He doesn’t have anything else to fill the time until Eric is free after six and even then he’ll have to be careful about when and how he show’s up at the house.

The next couple of months are going to be tedious. He has a feeling by the time the Falconers have their thing he’s going to be over being pissed that anyone cares who he sleeps with and anxious about who might hate him or try to hurt Eric and just want the damn thing over and done with already.

He waits for Eric’s  and then puts his phone back in his bag and goes off to find the car.

* * *

It’s nearly midnight when Jack and Eric are finally making up the inflatable mattress on the floor next to Eric’s bed. Eric hadn’t said anything earlier in the evening, when Jack had shown up at the Haus with sheets the same color as the ones on their bed back in Pawtucket, along with a duvet cover and new duvet to match. But he hadn’t needed to say anything because the look on his face, when he pulled the packages out of the IKEA bag, had been utterly transparent.

He’d also bought Eric a duplicate of the rug that Eric had on his side of their bed, the one that makes Jack think of honeycomb. Jack had worried it might be overkill, standing in the checkout line, but the second he unrolls it next to the mattress, where it fits perfectly between Eric’s side of the mattress (they already have sides of the bed, Jack realizes, that transcend specific locations -- is that normal?) and the door.

“Oh, Jack,” Eric says, looking down at it. “I didn’t need -- you really shouldn’t have.” In a tone that tells Jack exactly the opposite.

“I definitely should,” Jack says, straightening. “Any better?”

“What?”

“Your ‘terrible horrible no good very bad’ room,” Jack quotes back at him with a smile. “Any better now?”

Eric’s face softens and he steps around the edge of the mattress so they’re both standing on the carpet. “Much,” he agrees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went poking around on IKEA's website for a suitable carpet and I [rather like this one](http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10229035/).
> 
> While I was there, here are the [sky blue sheets](http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20230496/) and [duvet cover](http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/90230073/) as well.


	13. Friday, 14 August 2015

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Again, this project wouldn't have been sustainable without the cheerleading of everyone who has been reading and commenting and telling me what they particularly love about this 'verse. Y'all are an inspiration and keep me on my toes. THANK YOU.

When the alarm on Eric’s phone goes off at 5:50 he hits the seven-minute snooze without fully waking up and rolls over to pull Jack closer with grabby hands. Jack, Eric has learned -- contrary to all preconceptions -- is a sprawling stomach-sleeper. Apparently, air mattresses are no exception because Jack has kicked the bottom edge of the sheet and duvet askew and has one arm twisted under his torso and behind his back in a position that must be cutting off circulation. More importantly, his position is frustrating Eric in his quest to get as up close and personal as he can to his boyfriend before the alarm goes off again at 5:57.

Eric nuzzles his way over Jack’s exposed shoulder, tugging at Jack's upper body until Jack wakes and realizes what Eric wants. He lifts himself up enough to pull his shoulders back into alignment and curls his spine into an acceptable shape for Eric to plaster himself against with wordless murmurs of approval.

Eric presses his face against the nape of Jack’s neck and inhales, allowing himself the luxury of drifting for another few minutes in the narrow slice of time when he will be awake enough to appreciate Jack’s presence but not awake enough that his brain starts reminding him of everything he has to do today. Reminding him that Jack will be leaving, probably sooner rather than later, and that he won’t have anyone but a melancholy Señor Bun sharing his bed tonight.

At least they can be melancholy together?

Jack shifts his hips, pressing his ass back against Eric in a way what feels more comforting than the start of anything particularly energetic. Jack will be awake enough to remember that Eric needs to be at Faber for the start of morning practice by 6:20 and it’s Jack so obviously he takes practice seriously enough that he won’t try to distract Eric into being late.

Eric tries not to be disappointed by the certainty with which he knows this.

The alarm goes off a second time and Eric groans resentfully at it, peeling himself reluctantly away from Jack and leaning back to fumble for the phone and hit snooze his allotted second time.

“Why do you set it fifteen minutes earlier than you actually need to?” Jack had asked with amusement the night before, as he’d rummaged in his overnight bag for his toothbrush and Eric kicked his desk chair in desultory circles while he programmed in the alarms for the regular morning practices.

“Not all of us can just … _leap_ out of bed bright-eyed and bushy-tailed you know,” Eric had said, grumpily, because he was tired and apparently part of him still kind of sort of resented the fact that Jack had dragged him out of bed _even earlier_ for all of those mornings of checking practice. Even if, in retrospect, checking practice had turned out to be an awkward and mostly adorable Jack Zimmermann courtship ritual.

Eric might possibly have certain fantasies that revolve around Jack and checking practice. Although they’re not so much about checking as they are about the feeling of Jack’s body close to his, protecting him even while they collided on the ice. He snuggles in more firmly against Jack's naked back, enjoying the unadulterated access, rubbing his nose against the bump at the top of Jack's spine. Jack reaches back with his right hand and slides a warm palm down over Eric's bare bum, pulling Eric's leg closer, in along the back of his own thigh.  _God yes_ , Eric thinks.  _Please let's just stay like this forever?_

“Anyway,” Eric had pointed out as he saved the settings in his alarm clock app and tossed the phone onto their mattress in the general direction of his pillow. “If I set the alarm for fourteen minutes earlier than I need to get up that’s fourteen minutes during which I get to cuddle your ass. So don’t complain.”

“Seven more minutes of cuddling?” Jack asks, now, hitching onto his back and pulling Eric back in against his side as the alarm goes dormant for a second time. The mattress has lost a bit of air during the night and Eric feels it dip and sway, pushing their bodies together a little like they’re in a hammock or on a water bed. “Do morning cuddles include kisses?”

Eric twitches his nose in annoyed affection. Jack is _really_ lucky that that Eric is so besotted with him because otherwise chirping before coffee would be met with a lot more sass. “Of _course_  morning cuddles include kisses you ridiculous man. On what morning upon which have we woken up together have I _not_ demanded kisses?”

“Oh, _demanded_. Is that what we’re calling it now?” Jack pushes up on an elbow so he can lean over and brush his lips against Eric’s, tug at Eric’s bottom lip lightly with his teeth, then let go and press in deeper. Eric inhales through his nose so they don’t have to stop and pushes a knee between Jack’s thighs, urging him to roll closer and pin Eric a bit more firmly to the mattress. It doesn’t always feel good, Jack over top of him, but this morning it’s just what Eric needs: the assurance that Jack will hold him, enfold him, will sometimes be willing to keep him still when he needs to stop moving for awhile and just _be_.

Jack must feel the way Eric goes boneless, pliant beneath him because he stops pressing for more and simply holds himself there with Eric beneath him. Jack presses his face  into the crook of Eric’s neck, breathing unhurried and deep against Eric’s skin. In the semi-light of the early morning coming around the edge of Eric’s curtains, Eric stares at the patterns in the plaster ceiling and pays attention to the way Jack’s thumb is drawing tiny soothing circles on the pulse point of his wrist.

They’re still laying like that, breathing together, when Eric’s alarm goes off for the second time.

“Fuck hockey,” Eric sighs, without particular heat, although he sure as hell means it in that moment.

Jack laughs, pressing gentle kisses against Eric’s neck as he stretches for his phone again and silences it. He pulls up his morning practice playlist and sets it to cycle through while he drags himself out of bed to brush his teeth and pull on sweats and a hoodie for his walk to Faber. Upstairs in the attic he can hear Ransom and Holster knocking around and across the hall Chowder’s alarm is squawking. The Haus is slowly but surely waking up.

He doesn’t want to ask, but he makes himself anyway. “When do you have to leave?”

Jack, uncharacteristically, is still in bed with the sheet and duvet pooled over his legs. He’s watching Eric get dressed and shrugs when Eric asks.

“I thought I’d go out for a run in the Arb,” he says. “And then stay so we can do breakfast?”

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to get out of team breakfast,” Eric says, reluctantly.

“Coffee then,” Jack says easily. “I don’t have to be at the Martins until five and the only thing I was going to do before then was swing by the gym for some weight training. I brought my laptop so I can write Papa that email while you’re gone.”

Eric pokes Jack’s foot with the toe of his sneaker. “You better be careful there, mister, or I’m gonna fall ridiculously in love with you. You know that, right?”

Jack smiles. “I got there first,” he says.

* * *

In retrospect it takes Eric an embarrassingly long time to realize he’s being _handled_ by his Hausmates. They’re all in the locker room washing up and getting dressed after practice and then Lardo’s talking with Ransom over a shared clipboard and Holster’s pulling Nursey and Dex aside to discuss something in serious captain-y tones, clapping Nursey on the shoulder and giving Dex a little fist-bump to the upper arm, and then Chowder’s laughing at something Nursey says back and then before Eric realizes what’s happening the locker room is emptying of everyone except the five of them.

“I…?” he says, zipping up his hoodie and reaching for his messenger bag. “Shouldn’t we be…?”

“Haus meeting.” Lardo says, snapping the cap of her ballpoint pen back on the barrel with an authoritative _snick_. “All important. Holster’s deputized Nursey and Dex to make sure all the frogs get to team breakfast.”

“What are we meeting about?” Eric asks, baffled, since no one had mentioned this to him the day before and they’d spent the better part of four hours last night chilling in the living room with the remains of four boxes of pizza and binge-watching episodes of _Fringe_. It’s true that Nursey and Dex had been there for most of it, before leaving together around quarter of ten to go back to their dorm, but --

“Someone get this boy a latte,” Ransom suggests, smirking, and Chowder digs in his bag and tosses Eric a Gatorade which Eric automatically catches.

“ _What_ ,” he asks, feeling achey and grumpy and thrown off his game because all he really wants to do is go and spend a couple more hours with Jack before --

 _Oh_. “Guys?”

“Dude,” Lardo says. “Did you think you were gonna get to hog Jack for breakfast all by yourself?”

It’s easier, walking back across campus to the Haus, than it was shuffling still half-asleep in the opposite direction. In part because the workout’s woken him up, as it always does, and in part because he feels bouyed by the joyful conspiracy of his friends. It’s not that he expected them to be homophobic or otherwise weird about him and Jack dating. Exactly. (Except for the part of him that _always_ worries about that with _everyone_.) It’s that he hadn’t expected -- hadn’t thought that they’d take their friendship responsibilities quite so seriously.

In addition to the spreadsheet, he’d learned the night before, there had also been a PowerPoint. And Holster and Ransom had taken turns role-playing sleezy c-string paparazzi journalists, pressing the others to disclose -- or appear to disclose -- juicy tidbits about _Jack Zimmermann’s gay love affair!!_

He thinks it’s probably overkill. But it still means something that they’re prepared. He could probably use a lesson or two himself -- though he and Jack have already been promised some coaching fielding the relationship questions with Erin’s staff later in September.

Not until they get back to the Haus and he steps through the front door on Chowder’s heels does he realize that the breakfast-with-Jack plan is, in fact, a breakfast _by_ Jack plan.

“Why do I smell sausages and pancakes and maple syrup?” he asks, sniffing the air. Ransom and Holster high-five each other over Lardo's head as Lardo rolls her eyes ( _you are all being impossible dorks why do I even bother_ ) and Chowder grins, all but points toward the kitchen, bouncing excitedly on his toes.

Eric follows his nose -- and the sound of Ray Lamontagne (through the Pawtucket Public Library’s CD collection --  _oh my god so embarrassing_  -- Jack’s slowly joining the twenty-first century) -- down the hall and through the door of the Haus kitchen where he beholds the wondrous sight of Jack and Caitlin discussing the proper way to flip pancakes on the cast iron griddle Jack had sworn came ready-installed with Betsy II.

“Now just what --” he starts, torn between feeling indignant for being (it appears) the only one left out of this little secret and just a little bit weepy at how _kind_ it feels that they've orchestrated this for him. For him and Jack.

Eric’s good at _being_ kind but he’s never been so sure about how to go about accepting kindness from others.

“Hey Eric!” Caitlin says, turning to wave the spatula at him. “Hey everybody else!”

“Those smell awesome, Cait!” Chowder says, sliding around where Eric is apparently frozen in the doorway temporarily unable to move and snagging a sausage from one of the plates on the table on his way by. He leans in to give Farmer a smacking kiss on the cheek and she smiles benignly at the attention.

“Yeah,” she says, “Well, they’re _Jack’s_ recipe.”

“Papa’s, actually,” Jack corrects her, peering down at the griddle in front of him and gingerly flipping the pancake closest to him. When that one successfully turns in one piece he goes onto the second. “He learned it from a guy who used to play with the Penguins. Oscar. From Sweden originally. Lives in Tahoe now. I picked up the lingonberry jam yesterday when I was at IKEA.”

“Oh my god,” Ransom says in awed tones behind Eric’s shoulder. “Holtzy! It’s like we have our _very own hockey wives_!”

“I thought _I_ was your hockey wife,” Holster responds.

As one, the entire kitchen turns to look at where Holster and Ransom are standing in the doorway behind Eric. Eric, too, blinks and turns to stare at them.

“What,” Holster says. He crosses his arms and leans against the doorjamb with an eyebrow raised. He’s responding to the entire group but looking smugly at Jack when he says it. “You thought you were the first incredibly gay duo to come out of Samwell Men’s Hockey?”

Eric starts giggling and can’t stop and then Chowder starts sniggering and Caitlin and Lardo are laughing and pretty soon everyone is wiping tears from their eyes -- but in a totally good way. And then Jack (the only one who hasn’t actually laughed aloud because he's concentrating on pancakes, but whose eyes betray how happy he is) waves everyone into the kitchen and urges them to take a seat. As they all settle around the kitchen table, piled high with food, Jack leans over to add the plate of folded, sugar-dusted pancakes to the smorgasbord laid out before them. As he straighens his back and pulls back to pull out the chair beside Eric he brushes a kiss against Eric’s cheek and Eric turns into the touch to whisper his thanks.

Because somehow, miraculously, he thinks maybe his junior year is going to one of the best on record. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I WARNED THIS WOULD BE DOMESTIC FLUFF SO I REFUSE TO APOLOGIZE FOR THE TREACLE THAT IS THE ENDING.
> 
> [Fringe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fringe_\(TV_series\)) is a sci-fi drama series that ostensibly takes place in Boston but is actually filmed in Toronto and is hilariously lax about finding locations that in any way approximate the real-world locations they're supposed to represent. I bet Ransom, Holster, Lardo, and Shitty have turned it into a drinking game and I bet Lardo always wins.
> 
> Several of you already caught the reference to [_Alexander's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6rp0SZX7lg) by Judith Viorst in the last chapter and the texting chapter before that. It's become such a cultural reference point for me I forgot to even credit the source! Bad librarian. No cookies!!
> 
> I think Jack might like Ray Lamontagne's _Trouble_ album which came out in 2004 -- the twenty-first century! I bet when Eric walks into the kitchen [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMcMAsNXfiw) is playing.
> 
> I made Oscar up on the spot and have no idea of any Swedish nationals have ever played for the Penguins let alone if they have a favorite recipe for pancakes. Have [a recipe ](http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/swedish-pancakes-recipe.html) for Swedish Pancakes.
> 
> Holster’s “incredibly gay duo” crack is a reference to an old recurring sketch from _Saturday Night Live_. Because of course Holster’s watched their entire back catalog.


End file.
